REMARKS
MR. J. P. COLLIER'S AND MR. C. KNIGHT'S
EDITIONS
OF
SHAKESPEARE.
BY
THE REV. ALEXANDER DYCE.
At hoc, inquies, leve est. .... Nihil contemnendum est, neque in bello,
neque in re critica." PORSON ad Eurip. Med. 139.
LONDON:
EDWARD MOXON, DOVER STREET.
MDCCCXLIV.
PR
LONDON:
PRINTED BY KOBSON, LEVEY, AND FRANKLYN,
Great New Street, Fetter Lane.
TO THE
REVEREND JOHN MITFORD.
MY DEAR MITFORD,
I HAVE two reasons for inscribing the present volume to
you: — the first, because, in the wide range of your learning, you
have not neglected the minutiae of verbal criticism ; the second,
because you at least will read it with a conviction that it origi-
nated in pure love to Shakespeare, and not in the desire of
decrying the labours of those who have thought themselves com-
petent to become his editors.
Believe me
Your sincere friend,
A. DYCE.
PREFACE.
HAD I committed to paper all the remarks which
occurred to me during a careful perusal of Mr. Col-
lier's and Mr. Knight's editions of Shakespeare, they
would have far exceeded the limits of a single volume,
— for the passages both of the text and notes, to
which I found weighty objections, were, like the afflic-
tions of Dicaeopolis, -^appuxoffioyagyocga : even those
remarks now printed form only a part of what I
had actually written down ; but the Publisher very
reasonably disliking a bulky book, it became necessary
to make the present selection, and consequently to
weaken the force of my protest against those two
editions.
I must not be understood as if I meant to say that
the same faults are always common to the editions
of Mr, Collier and Mr. Knight ; for, though it is
my deliberate opinion that Shakespeare has suffered
greatly from both, yet the one appears to me to
be sometimes right where the other is wrong, and
VI PREFACE.
vice versa. Some of my remarks apply to the modern
editors generally.
The censure which I presume to pass so decidedly
on those two editions does not extend to the biographi-
cal portions. Mr. Collier's Life of Shakespeare exhibits
the most praiseworthy research, a careful examina-
tion of all the particulars which have been discovered
concerning the great dramatist, and the most inti-
mate acquaintance with the history of our early
stage. Mr. Knight's Shakspere, a Biography, I have
not read.
The few notes on Gilford's edition of Ben Jonson
will hardly be considered as out of place in a volume
of this description.
A. DYCE.
ERRATUM.
Page 3, L 25, /or " the barge she rode in" read " the barge she sat in.'
CONTENTS.
SHAKESPEARE.
PAGE
THE TEMPEST 1
Two GENTLEMEN OF VERONA ...... 10
MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR 14
MEASURE FOR MEASURE 17
THE COMEDY OF ERRORS ....... 26
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING . . . . . 31
LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST ....... 37
MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM ...... 44
MERCHANT OF VENICE ....... 52
As YOU LIKE IT ........ 60
TAMING OF THE SHREW ....... 65
ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL ...... 69
TwELFTH-NlGHT ........ 74
THE WINTER'S TALE 79
KING JOHN ......... 87
KING RICHARD II. ....... 97
FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV : 104
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV. . . . . .111
KING HENRY V 117
FIRST PART OF KING HENRY VI 123
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY VI 127
THIRD PART OF KING HENRY VI 132
KING RICHARD III 135
KING HENRY VIII 137
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA . . 146
viii CONTENTS.
CORIOLANUS . . • •
PAGE
1 'iS
TITUS ANDRONICUS .
ROMEO AND JULIET . • • • •
1 78
TIMON OF ATHENS .....
JULIUS CJESAR • • • * - i*
MACBETH ....... . . 188
HAMLET
KINO LEAR .
OTHELLO . . . - • • • -233
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA . . • • • • 245
CYMBELINE ....••••• ^*
PERICLES ......... 261
RAPE OF LUCRECE ....••• 272
SONNETS ..... • • • • 273
A LOVER'S COMPLAINT ....... 275
BEN JONSON.
EVERY MAN OUT OF HIS HUMOUR 279
CYNTHIA'S REVELS 280
THE Fox . . . . . . . - . .282
THE SILENT WOMAN . . . " . . . . 284
BARTHOLOMEW FAIR ....... 286
THE DEVIL is AN Ass . . . . . . , 289
THE STAPLE OF NEWS . . . -. . ' . .291
THE MAGNETIC LADY ' . 293
A TALE OF A TUB 294
THE SAD SHEPHERD 296
ADDENDA . 299
REMARKS, &c.
THE TEMPEST.
[Vol. i. COLLIER ; vol. iv. KNTGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 9 ; K. p. 139.
" Alon. Good boatswain, have care. Where's the master ? Play
the men.
Boats. I pray now, keep below.
Ant. Where is the master, boatswain?"
Mr. Knight gives the last of these speeches thus ;
" Ant. Where is the master, boson ?"
and with the following note ;
" In the first edition (1623) Antonio here uses the sailor's word
boson, instead of the more correct ' boatswain,' which is put in the
mouth of the King of Naples. The modern editors have made no
distinction ; although the language of the king, throughout the play,
is grave and dignified, and that of the usurping duke, for the most
part, flippant and familiar. The variation in the first edition could
scarcely be accidental."
The " variation" arose merely from the unsettled state of
our early orthography.
In Taylor's prose tract called The Dolphins Danger and
Deliverance, &c., we find ; " Fran. Constable, Boatswaine . . .
Hump. Lee, Boatsons mate." p. 32 ; " and the Boson (seeing
them flye) most vndantedly with a whistle blourd them to
the skirmish, if so they durst." p. 35, — Workes, ed. 1630.
Here we have the word spelt in three ways.
I may notice, that an expression which immediately
precedes the present passage, " Blow, till thou burst thy
wind," occurs (slightly varied) in Taylor's description of a
B
THE TEMPEST.
storm at sea, (The Praise of Hemp-seed, p. 65 [second],
Workes, ed. 1630),— a description of considerable length,
and well worthy of the attention of those who are curious
about nautical terms. It is, in all probability, a recollec-
tion of what Taylor had himself witnessed ; for, in A Fune-
rall Elegie on the Earle of Nottingham (Workes, p. 326), he
tells us that he had "both seru'd and sail'd" under that
nobleman; and in his Certain Travailes of an uncertain
Journey, &c. published in 1653 (when he was " neer seventy
five") he says,
" Seven times at sea I serv'd Elizabeth." p. 10.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 11; K. p. 140.
" Gon. He'll be hanged yet,
Though every drop of water swear against it,
And gape at wid'st to glut him. [A confused noise within.'] Mercy
on us f —
We split, we split / — Farewell, my wife and children f —
Farewell, brother! — We split, we split, we split ! —
Ant. Let's all sink with the king. [Exit.
Seb. Let's take leave of him. [Exit.
Gon. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre
of barren ground ; long heath, brown furze, any thing. The wills
above be done ! but I would fain die a dry death. [Exit."
" This conclusion of Gonzalo's [first] speech is verse to the ear,
as well as to the eye, in the folio, 1623, but modern editors have
converted it into prose, and so have printed it. Johnson supposed
it might be part of the ' confused noise within.' " COLLIER.
Gentle reader, compare the passionate exclamations,
" Mercy on us," &c., with the speech last cited, where all
is calmness and self-possession ; and you will surely be as
much surprised as I am that any modern editor should think
of assigning the former to Gonzalo.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 17 ; K. p. 147.
" In few, they hurried us aboard a bark,
Bore us some leagues to sea, where they prepar'd
THE TEMPEST. 3
A rotten carcass of a butt, not rigg'd,
Nor tackle, sail, nor mast ; the very rats
Instinctively have quit it : there they hoist us," &c.
" So every ancient edition ; but since Howe's time boat has
usually been substituted for ' butt.' As ' butt' is perfectly intel-
ligible, with reference to the sort of vessel, without tackle, sail, or
mast, in which Prospero and Miranda were sent to sea, we retain
it." COLLIER.
" Butt is the reading of the original copies. It is clear that
we are not justified in adopting the modern substitution of boat.
Whether the idea of a wine-butt was literally meant to be con-
veyed may be questionable ; but the word, as it stands in the ori-
ginal, gives us the notion of a vessel even more insecure than the
most rotten boat. Mr. Hunter would adopt Butt, (which is the
word of the first and second folios, and with a capital) upon ' the
great critical canon of the Durior Lectio pr&ferenda' ' KNIGHT.
A BUTT (and perhaps, as Mr. Knight says, a WINE-BUTT)
big enough to contain, not only Prospero and his infant
daughter, but " food," " fresh water," " rich garments, linens,
stuffs, and necessaries," and several "volumes" from Pros-
pero's library ! ! — it must have been the Great Tun of Heidel-
berg, borrowed for the occasion. Why did not Mr. Knight
insert here a wood-cut of this remarkable vessel ? it would
have formed a much more interesting illustration than " the
barge she rode in," which he gives us in Antony and Cleo-
patra.
Surely the context is alone sufficient to stave the " butt "
" not rigg'd,
Nor tackle, sail, nor mast ;"
(If the vessel in question had really been a BUTT, would
Prospero have complained of such deficiencies? — deficiencies
which no human ingenuity could have supplied.)
" the very rats
Instinctively have quit it."
(Do those animals live in butts? — The rats "instinctively"
had left the boat, — they knew by instinct that it was likely
to go to pieces.)
On the words, " Nor tackle, sail, nor mast," Mr. Collier
THE TEMPEST.
observes; " See R. Greene's < Pandosto, or the Triumph of
Time,' in Shakespeare's Library, vol. i. p. 18, where he gives
an account of the turning adrift of the heroine ' in a boat
having neither saile, nor rudder to guide it;'" — a note
which, if it proves any thing, proves that " butt" is not the
right reading in The Tempest.
ACT II.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 48 ; K. p. 176.
" CaL I pry'thee, let me bring thee where crabs grow ;
And I with my long nails will dig thee pig-nuts ;
Shew thee a jay's nest, and instruct thee how
To snare the nimble marmozet : I'll bring thee
To clustering filberds, and sometimes I'll get thee
Young scamels from the rock."
" It has been doubted whether by ' scamels' (as the word is
printed in all the original editions) Shakespeare intended a fish or
a bird. Kamm-muschell (as Mr. Thorns observes to me) in German,
means a scallop, and hence he supposes ' scamel ' may possibly have
been derived : Holt also states, though the assertion may require to
be confirmed, that in some parts of England limpets are called scams.
On the other hand, Theobald altered ' scamels ' to sea-mells, and
that reading Malone followed, on the ground (which is by no means
clear) that a sea-mell is a species of gull, which builds its nest iu
the rock. Under these difficulties we adhere to the old ortho-
graphy." COLLIER.
" Scamels. This is the word of the original; and we leave it as
we find it. The word has been changed into sea-mells, which the
commentators tell us is a species of gull. We believe there is no
such word as sea-mell, or sea-mall, although there is sea-maw or
sea-mew. Mr. Hunter very judiciously observes that the rhythm is
destroyed by substituting for scamels a word whose first syllable is
long." KNIGHT.
That " scamels" is a misprint, I have not the slightest
doubt. That shell-fish were not intended by the corrupted
word, is evident from the epithet " young ; " for, when the
gathering of shell-fish is spoken of, why should young ones
be especially mentioned ?
THE TEMPEST. O
Mr. Knight is mistaken in supposing that there is no such
word as " sea-mall." R. Holme, after describing the Sea-
Mew, has a separate article on " The Sea Mall, the Bill
white, but yellow towards the tip, bending towards the point ;
the feet of a pale green, claws black," &c. Acad. of Armory,
1688, B. ii. p. 262. But though there is undoubtedly such
a word as sea-mall, and though perhaps there is also such a
word as sea-mell, it by no means follows that " scamels"
(without a hyphen and with a single I) should be a misprint
for either " sea-malls" or " sea-mells."
Qy. is the right reading " staniels ? " (Our early authors
generally spelt staniel what is now written stannyel : of this a
dozen examples might easily be adduced.)
In the first place, " staniels" comes very near the trace of
the old letters, —
scamels
Secondly, " staniels" accords well with the context, " from
the rock ;" for the " Kestrel, Stannel, or Windhover ....
is one of our most common species [of hawks], especially in
the more rocky situations and high cliffs on our coasts, where
they breed." Montagu's Ornith. Diet.
Thirdly, in another passage of Shakespeare, where nobody
doubts that the genuine reading is staniel (or stannyel), all the
old eds. exhibit the gross misprint " stallion ;"
" And with what wing the stallion checks at it."
Twelfth-Night, act ii. sc. 5.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 49 ; K. p. 177.
" Cal. No more dams I'll make for fish ;
Nor fetch in firing
At requiring,
Nor scrape trenchering, nor wash dish," &c.
So too Messrs. Malone and Knight ! ! —
Read " trencher." — That " trenchering" is an error of the
printer (or transcriber), occasioned by the preceding words
and " require*/," is beyond a doubt.
THE TEMPEST.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 50.
" But these sweet thoughts do even refresh my labours ;
Most busy, least when I do it."
" The meaning of this passage seems to have been misunder-
stood by all the commentators. Ferdinand says that the thoughts
of Miranda so refresh his labours, that when he is most busy he
seems to feel his toil least. It is printed in the folio, 1623, ' Most
busy lest when I do it,' a trifling error of the press, corrected in
the folio, 1632, although Theobald tells us that both the oldest
editions read lest. Not catching the poet's meaning, he printed,
' Most busy-fess when I do it ;' and his supposed emendation has
ever since been taken as the text: even Capell adopted it. I
am happy to have Mr. Amyot's concurrence in this restoration."
COLLIER.
When Theobald made the emendation, ' Most 'busy-less,1
he observed, that " the corruption was so very little removed
from the truth of the text, that he could not afford to think
well of his own sagacity for having discovered it." The cor-
rection is, indeed, so obvious, that we may well wonder that
it had escaped his predecessors; but we must wonder ten
times more that one of his successors, in a blind reverence for
the old copy, should re-vitiate the text, and defend a corrup-
tion which outrages language, taste, and common sense.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 61.
" Thunder and lightning. Enter ARIEL like a harpy, claps his wings
upon the table, and, with a quaint device, the banquet vanishes."
Here Steevens has a long note ; but as he appears not to
have understood this stage-direction, I may just observe, that
the words, " with a quaint device, the banquet vanishes" mean
nothing more than that the mechanist of the theatre was to
do his best to make it seem that the harpy had devoured the
banquet. Compare what Prospero says soon after ;
" Bravely the figure of this harpy hast thou
Perform'd, my Ariel; a grace it had, devouring."
THE TEMPEST. 7
ACT IV.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 69 ; K. p. 198.
" You nymphs, call'd Naiads, of the wandering brooks," &c.
" Possibly, winding is the true word : all the folios repeat the
misprint of that of 1623, windring" COLLIER.
Mr. Knight retains " windering ;" and observes in a note,
" the epithet, of course, has the meaning of winding"
If " windering" means, " of course," winding, why did
not Shakespeare content himself with the latter word ? why
should he take the trouble of inventing a word, which those
readers only, who possessed the " quick conceit" of Mr.
Knight, could possibly understand ?
The true reading, I apprehend, is " winding."
ACT v.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 77; K. p. 208.
*' Where the bee sucks, there suck I ;
In a cowslip's bell I lie :
There I couch. When owls do cry,
On the bat's back I do fly,
After summer, merrily :
Merrily, merrily, shall I live now,
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough."
" In the original there is no point after 'couch;' but it seems
necessary, and was inserted by Malone." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight, in his text, gives the song thus ;
" Where the bee sucks, there suck I ;
In a cowslip's bell I lie :
There I couch when owls do cry,
On the bat's back I do fly
After summer merrily :
Merrily," &c.
and in his " Illustrations of Act v." favours us with the follow-
ing remarks ;
" We point the third line as in the original : —
' There I couch when owls do cry.'
8 THE TEMPEST.
Capell and Malone put a period after couch. This is making the verb
little more than a repetition of the preceding verb lie. The original
has no stop whatever after couch, and it has only a comma after cry.
Theobald changed the word summer into sunset. Warburton sup-
ports the old reading very ingeniously : — ' The roughness of winter
is represented by Shakspeare as disagreeable to fairies, and such-like
delicate spirits, who, on this account, constantly follow summer. Was
not this, then, the most agreeable circumstance of Ariel's new-re-
covered liberty, that he could now avoid winter, and follow summer
quite round the globe?' But here a new difficulty arises. Bats do
not migrate, as swallows do, in search of summer. Steevens, with
his own real ignorance, says that Shakspeare might, through his
ignorance of natural history, have supposed the bat to be a bird of
passage. He inclines, however, to the opinion, not that Ariel pursues
summer on a bat's wing, but that after summer is past he rides upon
the warm down of a bat's back. Excellent naturalist ! Why, the
bat is torpid after summer. If this exquisite song, then, is to be
subjected to this strict analysis, it is difficult to reduce all its images
to the measure of fitness and propriety. We are unwilling to intro-
duce into the text any conjectural emendation ; for the best inter-
pretation must seem forced when it disturbs a long- established and
familiar idea. We therefore follow the original exactly, leaving to
our readers to form their own interpretation. Claiming the same
liberty for ourselves, we believe the words of the song to be the same
as the poet wrote them, but that the punctuation (to express his idea
according to our modern notions of punctuation) ought to be as fol-
lows : —
' Where the bee sucks, there suck I ;
In a cowslip's bell I lie :
There I couch when owls do cry
On the bat's back. I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily, shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.'
We have here all the conditions of Ariel's existence expressed in the
most condensed form. In the day the fine spirit feeds with the bee,
or reposes in a cowslip's bell. In the night, when owls do cry, he
couches on the bat's back. The season here expressed is that of the
latter spring, or summer, when the bee is busy, and the field-flowers
are spreading their gay colours to the sun ;— when the owl hoots, as
in the May-time of the ' Midsummer-Night's Dream,' and the bat is
THE TEMPEST.
abroad. But there are other seasons. After summer Ariel still flies
merrily. The spirit has here described his habitual enjoyments and
occupations ; and then, bursting forth into a rapturous anticipation
of the happiness of his freedom, he sees only one long spring of
future pleasures,
' Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.' "
When Mr. Knight observed that " in the night, when owls
do cry, Ariel couches on the bat's back," he must have entirely
overlooked the word " There" (" There I couch"), which evi-
dently refers to " cowslip's bell," just as in the first line " there"
(" there I suck") refers to the preceding " Where the bee
sucks :" besides, according to Johnson's Dictionary) " To
couch" is " to lie down on a place of repose" — a definition
which certainly does not apply to Ariel's location on the
back of a bat, while that animal is (as Mr. Knight terms it)
" abroad," i. e. ranging about at full speed. In spite of any
objections that may be brought from " natural history," I
believe that Shakespeare intended to describe Ariel as flying
on the bat's back in pursuit of summer, like the swallow.
It is now my turn to offer what I consider as the proper
punctuation of this celebrated song ;
" Where the bee sucks, there suck I;
In a cowslip's bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat's back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough."
10
TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.
[Vol. i. COLLIER ; vol. i. KNIGHT.]
ACT II.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 115 ; K. p. 48.
" Val. Yourself, sweet lady ; for you gave the fire. Sir Thurio
borrows his wit from your ladyship's looks, and spends what he bor-
rows kindly in your company.
Val. I know it well, sir : you have an exchequer of words, and, I
think, no other treasure to give your followers ; for it appears by their
bare liveries, that they live by your bare words."
Mr. Knight gives these speeches according to what he calls
" the metrical arrangement in the original ;"
" Val. Yourself, sweet lady ; for you gave the fire :
Sir Thurio borrows his wit from your ladyship's looks,
And spends what he borrows, kindly in your company.
Val. I know it well, sir : you have an exchequer of words,
And, I think, no other treasure to give your followers ;
For it appears, by their bare liveries,
That they live by your bare words."
Metrical arrangement !
SCENE 5.— C. p. 123 ; K. p. 55.
" Speed. I tell thee, my master is become a hot lover.
Launce. Why, I tell thee, I care not though he burn himself in
love, if thou wilt go with me to the ale-house : if not, thou art an
Hebrew, a Jew, and not worth the name of a Christian."
" This passage has been misunderstood from defective pointing :
instead of a period after 'love' as in the old copies, we ought to
place a comma, the meaning being that Launce does not care whe-
ther Valentine burn himself in love or not, if Speed will but go to
the ale-house with him. This reading renders the word so, inserted
in the second folio, and subsequently adopted by all the commen-
tators, unnecessary." COLLIER.
TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA. 11
Mr. Knight gives (what Malone had proposed in a note) ;
" Laun. Why, I tell thee, I care not though he burn himself
in love. If thou wilt, go with me to the ale-house ; if not, thou art
an Hebrew," &c.
Mr. Collier dislocates and jumbles the text ; Mr. Knight
leaves it imperfect. That the word, which the second folio
supplies, had been omitted by mistake in the first, is evident
from the context : — " If thou wilt go with me to the ale-
house, so; if not, thou art an Hebrew," &c. In the first
scene of this act we have had,
" And, if it please you, so ; if not, why, so."
And see my remarks under the following passage of First
Part of Henry IF., act v. sc. 3, "Well, if Percy be alive, I'll
pierce him. If he do come in my way, so : if he do not, if I
come in his willingly, let him make a carbonado of me."
ACT v.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 166 ; K. p. 103.
" Vol. Then, I am paid ;
And once again I do receive thee honest.
Who by repentance is not satisfied,
Is nor of heaven, nor earth ; for these are pleas'd.
By penitence th' Eternal's wrath's appeas'd :
And, that my love may appear plain and free,
All that was mine in Silvia I give thee.
JuL O me unhappy!"
" Pope thought it ' very odd for Valentine to give up his mistress
at once, without any reason alleged ;' but it may in some degree ac-
count for that sudden relinquishment, if we suppose him not to have
overheard all that passed between Silvia and Proteus, and to draw
a conclusion against her from finding her in the forest with him.
There are few stage -directions in the folio, but the word aside has
been placed by modern editors after the speech of Valentine, ending,
' Love, lend me patience to forbear awhile.'
It is very easy to imagine him to withdraw, in order to get out of
the view of Silvia and Proteus, and to return to the scene, when he
12 TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.
hears the exclamations of Silvia on the violence offered by Proteus.
If he had overheard all that was said by them, he would have re-
entered before, and no such attempt could have been made by
Proteus. To read withdraws instead of aside, and to mark the re-
entrance of Valentine, is all that in this case is required/' COLLIER.
The stage-directions added by Mr. Collier to the part of
Valentine in this scene (pp. 165, 166) are quite at variance
with what was manifestly the author's intention.
Valentine, perceiving strangers approach, retires to the
back of the stage. Proteus, Silvia, and Julia enter ; and the
first words of Proteus declare his love to Silvia. Valentine,
in astonishment, exclaims aside,
" How like a dream is this I see and hear !
Love, lend me patience to forbear awhile,"
(i. e. not to discover myself till I have overheard more) ; and
he accordingly keeps in the background, till Proteus proceeds
to assault Silvia. It is evident that, after he has spoken the
line last cited, Valentine, instead of quitting the stage so as to
be out of ear-shot, listens with intense interest to the dialogue
between Proteus and Silvia.
A correspondent supplied Mr. Knight with the following
explanation of this passage ;
" The way in which I would read these three lines is as follows :
' By penitence the Eternal's wrath 's appeas'd ;
And that my love (i. e. for Proteus) may appear plain and free,
All (i. e. the wrath) that was mine in (i. e. on account of) Silvia,
I give thee (i. e. give thee up — forego)/
In other words, Valentine, having pardoned Proteus for his treachery
to himself, in order to convince him how sincere was his reconci-
liation (justifying, however, to .himself what he was about to do by
the consideration than even
' By penitence the Eternal's wrath's appeas'd),'
also forgives him the insult he had offered to Silvia. The use above
suggested of the preposition ' in' appears to me to be highly poetical.
It distinguishes between Valentine's wrath on his own account, for
Proteus' treachery to himself, and that of Silvia for the indignity
offered her by Proteus, which latter Valentine adopts and makes
his own, and so calls his wrath in Silvia. The use of the word
TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA. 13
' was' also supports this reading. Valentine wishes to express that
his wrath was past : had he been speaking of his ' love/ he would
have said 'is.'"
Now, neither the " correspondent" nor Mr. Knight (who
thinks this explanation of the passage "very preferable" to
any other) notice what immediately follows — viz. the speech
of Julia ;
" O me unhappy!"
She at least understood Valentine's words as conveying a
complete renunciation of Silvia in favour of Proteus. Let
us see also how they were understood by Charles Lamb and
his sister, — two highly gifted and simple-minded persons, who
had been reading Shakespeare together all their lives, content
with the plain and obvious meaning of his text :
" He [Protheus] expressed such a lively sorrow for the injuries
he had done to Valentine, that Valentine, whose nature was noble
and generous, even to a romantic degree, not only forgave and re-
stored him to his former place in his friendship, but in a sudden
flight of heroism he said, ' I freely do forgive you ; and all the in-
terest I have in Silvia, I give it up to you.' Julia, who was standing
beside her master as a page, hearing this strange offer, and fearing
Protheus would not be able with this new-found virtue to refuse
Silvia, fainted, and they were all employed in recovering her : else
would Silvia have been offended at being thus made over to Protheus,
though she could scarcely think that Valentine would long persevere
in this overstrained and too generous act of friendship." Tales from
Shakespeare, p. 29, ed. 1841."
What I have just quoted is the best possible comment
on our text. This " act of friendship" on the part of Valen-
tine is " overstrained and too generous ;" nor would Shake-
speare probably, if the play had been written in his maturer
years, have made Valentine give way to such " a sudden
flight of heroism;" but the Two Gentlemen of Verona was
evidently an early production of the great poet, and in many
a volume, popular during his youth, he had found similar
instances of romantic generosity.
MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR.
[Vol. i. COLLIER ; vol. iii. KNIGHT.]
ACT II.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 207 ; K. p. 54.
" I, I, I myself sometimes, leaving the fear of heaven on the left
hand, and hiding mine honour in my necessity, am fain to shuffle, to
hedge, and to lurch ; and yet you, rogue, will ensconce your rags,
your cat-a-mountain looks, your red-lattice phrases, and your bold-
beating oaths, under the shelter of your honour !"
What is the meaning of " bold-beating oaths," which is
passed over by Messrs. Malone, Collier, and Knight, without
any comment ? Mr. Halliwell's MS. (see Account of the only
known Manuscript of Shakespeare's Plays, &c., p. 13) has
" blunderbust oaths," the writer of that MS. having perceived
that the old reading was nonsense.
I have little doubt that Hanmer restored the genuine text
when he printed, "your red-lattice phrases [i. e. your ale-
house phrases], and your bull-baiting oaths."
The mistake might have originated at press from a simi-
larity of sound. It would be easy to adduce many examples
of such errors : e. g. the old ed. of Massinger's Bashful Lover,
act i. sc, 1, has ;
" I have seen him
Smell out her footing like a lime-hound, and knows [read nose] it
From all the rest of her train :"
and both the 4tos of the same poet's Duke of Milan, act v.
sc. 2, have ;
" whose honour writ not lord :"
where, in a copy of 4to, 1623, now in my possession, Mas-
singer has crossed out "honour" with a pen, and written
" owner " on the margin.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 218 ; K. p. 63.
" Go about the fields with me through Frogmore ; I will bring
MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR. 15
thee where mistress Anne Page is, at a farm-house a feasting, and
thou shall [shalt] woo her. Cried game, said I well ?"
No note in Mr. Collier's edition !
Mr. Knight prints " Cried game ? said I well ?" and con-
cludes a note by observing that " surely Anne Page, ' at a
farm-house a feasting,' is the game which the host has cried.
The meaning would be perfectly obvious were we to read
Cried I game ?"
On this passage, in the Variorum Shakespeare, we have
more than two pages of annotation, from which nothing is to
be learned except that the modern editors were unable to
ascertain the right lection, though Warburton came very
near it.
Read, " Cried / aim [i. e. did I give you encouragement] ?
said I well?" So in act iii. sc. 2 (p. 224), Ford says, "To
these violent proceedings all my neighbours shall cry aim
[i. e. give encouragement]."
ACT III.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 228 ; K. p. 77.
" I see what thou wert, if fortune thy foe were not, nature thy
friend."
" So the old copies, which seem to require no change : we must
understand being after ' nature/ " COLLIER.
Mr. Knight says, " We do not think that a perfect sense
can be made of the passage as it stands. The meaning, no
doubt, is, if Fortune were subdued by Nature, thou wouldst
be unparalleled."
It is evident that there is no corruption of the text, and
that Mr. Collier is right in understanding l being' after " nature :"
the meaning of the whole is — I see what thou wouldst be,
having such gifts of Nature, if Fortune did not bar thy ad-
vancement. Shakespeare wrote, " If Fortune thy foe were
not," — instead of the more natural collocation, " If Fortune
were not thy foe," — that the words " Fortune thy foe " might
answer to the commencement of the well-known ballad, " For-
tune, my foe"
16 MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 242; K. p. 89.
" Though what I am I cannot avoid, yet to be what I would not,
shall not make me tame : if I have horns to make one mad, let the
proverb go with me, I'll be horn mad."
So the other editors, — leaving an obvious error uncor-
rected. Read, " If I have horns to make me mad," &c.
The word " one" is frequently printed by mistake for
"me:" e.g. in Beaumont and Fletcher's Bloody Brother, or
Rollo Duke of Normandy, act i. sc. 1 , we find, according to
4to, 1639, and folio, 1679;
" 'Twill be expected that they should be good,
Or their bad manners will be imputed yours.
Bald. 'Twas not in one, my lord, to alter nature."
while 4to, 1640, gives rightly, " 'Twas not in me, my lord,"
&c.
17
MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
[Vol. ii. COLLIER ; vol. iii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 10.
" Lucio. Thou concludest like the sanctimonious pirate, that
went to sea with the ten commandments, but scraped one out of
the table.
2 Gent. Thou shalt not steal ?
Lucio. Ay, that he razed.
1 Gent. Why ? 'Twas a commandment to command the captain
and all the rest from their functions : they put forth to steal."
" It may be doubted whether what follows this interrogatory
[' Why ?'] do not belong to Lucio, rather than to the gentleman
who is thus made to ask a question and answer it himself."
COLLIER.
The fact is, the Gentleman does not ask a question. Here,
as in very many passages of early books, the compositor has
put a point of interrogation after " Why," when the word is
merely used emphatically. So in Beaumont and Fletcher's
Coxcomb ;
" Ant. Why? this will gaine me everlasting glory."
Works, p. 102. ed. 1647.
" Good deare sweete hart to bed.
Merc. Why I am going ?"
Id. p. 112.
" how dost thou ?
Vio. Why? well."
Id. p. 114.
" Madge. How dost thou now?
Vio. Why ? very well I thanke you."
Id. ibid.
and in their Triumph of Love (Four Plays in One) ;
" Ger. I would reveal it : 'tis a heavie tale :
Canst thou be true, and secret still ?
Ferd. Why, friend ?
c
18 MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
If you continue true unto yourself,
I have no means of falsehood."
Works, p. 544. ed. 1679.
Some years before the appearance of Mr. Collier's edition,
Mr. Knight (in his Pictorial Shakspere) had given the passage
rightly ;
" 1 Gent. Why, 'twas a commandment," &c.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 14; K. p. 387.
" Clo. Here comes signior Claudio, led by the provost to prison ;
and there's madam Juliet. {Exeunt.
SCENE III.
The Same.
Enter Provost, CLAUDIO, JULIET, and Officers; Lucio, and two
Gentlemen."
As there is no change of place here, a new " Scene" ought
not to have been marked. This impropriety occurs frequently
in all the modern editions of Shakespeare : see, for instance,
The Merchant of Venice, act ii. " Scene vi. ;" Pericles, act v.
" Scene ii."
SCENE 4.— C. p. 18 ; K. p. 391.
" We have strict statutes, and most biting laws,
(The needful bits and curbs to head-strong weeds,)
Which for this fourteen years we have let sleep ;
Even like an o'er-grown lion in a cave,
That goes not out to prey."
" In the folios, slip is printed, in all probability, for ' sleep ;' the
simile which follows seems to correct the error ; and in the next act
Angelo says that the law ' hath slept.' " COLLIER.
Mr. Knight, — who retains "slip," and says that "the
Duke compares himself with the animal * that goes not out to
prey,'" — supposes that "sleep" was first introduced into the
passage by Theobald ; but long before Theobald's time, that
alteration was made by Davenant in The Law against Lovers
(a drama founded on the present play and Much ado about
MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 19
Nothing), Works, p. 279; and I agree with Mr. Collier in
thinking it the right reading.
Both Mr. Collier and Mr. Knight state that the word
" Becomes," which occurs a little after, was supplied by Pope :
in Davenant's alteration of the passage, ubi supra, Pope found
" become."
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 23 ; K. p. 397.
" Guiltier than him they try : what's open made to justice,
That justice seizes : what know the laws,
That thieves do pass on thieves ? 'Tis very pregnant," &c.
The passage ought certainly to be arranged (as Steevens
suggested) thus;
" Guiltier than him they try : what's open made
To justice, that justice seizes : what know the laws,
That thieves," &c.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 24 ; K. p. 398.
" Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall :
Some run from breaks of ice, and answer none,
And some condemned for a fault alone."
" Thus the text stands in the old copies, which seems right ;
the meaning being, that some escape without responsibility, even
though the danger seem as imminent as when the ice breaks under
them ; but Malone and others would change the expression into
' brakes of vice,' and it would be an easy corruption, if there were
any necessity for a change. It is certain, as Steevens shows at large,
that an old instrument of torture was called ' a brake,' but not by
any means certain that Shakespeare intended a reference to it."
COLLIER.
Here Mr. Collier has silently made an alteration (" breaks"),
which was originally proposed by Steevens, but which that
commentator afterwards repudiated. The old copies have
" brakes of Ice."
Mr. Knight retains the original reading, but observes ;
" We are by no means sure that in the crowding together of
20 MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
images which we find in this play a double image may not have
been intended ;
• Some run from brakes, off ice, and answer none :' "
a conjecture which no one will approve.
For my own part, I feel convinced that Shakespeare wrote
" brakes," i. e. instruments of torture : the word in that sense
is by no means uncommon ; for instance, Palsgrave has,
" I brake on a brake or payne bauke, as men do mysdoers to
confesse the trouthe, le gehynne" Lesdarcissement de la Lang. Fr.
1530, fol. clxxi. (Table of Verbes).
I am equally confident that " Ice" is a typographical error
for " vice :" our early printers had a remarkable proneness
to blunder in words commencing with the letter v ; so in both
the folios of Beaumont and Fletcher we find ;
"And run like molten gold through every sin [read vein}."
The Coxcomb, act ii. sc. 4.
" If that the least puff of the rough north wind
Blast our times [read vines'] burden, rendering to our palates
The charming juice less pleasing."
The Fair Maid of the Inn, act i. sc. 1 .
where Mason absurdly defends, and Weber adopts, the read-
ing of the old eds.
" Mont Credit me, loving boy,
A free and honest nature may be oppress'd,
Tir'd with courtesies from a liberal spirit,
When they exceed his means of gratitude.
Ver. But 'tis a due [read vice with the excellent old MS. in my
possession] in him, that, to that end,
Extends his love or duty."
The Honest Man's Fortune, act iv. sc. 1.
and in the first folio ;
" Would she make rise oft so, I were most happy."
The Little French Lawyer, act i. sc. 2.
the MS. from which the play was printed in that folio having
doubtless had "vsef and the second folio rightly gives " use."
When Weber published (from a MS. which is now in my
possession) The Faithful Friends, a play attributed to Beau-
mont and Fletcher, he gave a passage in act iii. sc. 3, thus ;
MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 21
" The chief part I must play, and till my bones
And sinews crack," &c.
mistaking the reading of the MS. (where the tall v looks, at
the first glance, very like a b) " vaines" (veins) for " bones."
Again, in The Comedy of Errors, act ii. sc. 2, we meet
with the following line ;
" I live disstain'd [all the old eds. distain'd], thou undishonoured."
where Mr. Collier says, " i. e. unstained. The use of the word
in this sense is, if not solitary, very uncommon ;" and where
Mr. Knight gives the gloss " unstained" without farther com-
ment.— Now, the verb distain, meaning — to stain, blot, sully,
is a word of very frequent occurrence in the writings of
Shakespeare's contemporaries ; and can we suppose for a mo-
ment that he would use it in a sense directly opposite to that
in which it was universally employed? The fact undoubtedly
is, that in this passage of The Comedy of Errors, the MS. <
having " iwstain'd," the original compositor mistook the initial '
v for a d,~and. the first half of the n for an i.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 3* ; K. p. 407.
" The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe,
Become them with one half so good a grace
As mercy does. If he had been as you, and you as he,
You would have slipt like him ; but he, like you,
Would not have been so stern."
This arrangement of the verse is very objectionable. The
passage ought to stand either as Davenant (who altered a few
words) gave it in The Law against Lovers ( Works, p. 286) ;
" The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe,
Become them with one half so good a grace
As mercy does. If he had been as you,
And you as he, you would have slipt like him ;
But he, like you, would not have been so stern."
or, as Mr. Knight regulates it ;
" The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe,
Become them with one half so good a grace
As mercy does.
If he had been as you, and you as he,
MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
You would have slipt like him ; but he, like you,
Would not have been so stern."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 35.
" The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept :
Those many had not dar'd to do that evil,
If the first, that did th' edict infringe,
Had answer'd for his deed : now, 'tis awake ;
Takes note of what is done, and, like a prophet,
Looks in a glass, that shows what future evils
(Either now, or by remissness new-conceiv'd,
As so in progress to be hatch'd and born,)
Are now to have no successive degrees,
But here they live to end."
" This is the reading of all the folios : Sir Thomas Hanmer al-
tered the text to ' ere they live, to end;' and Malone to 'where they
live, to end.' There is no need of alteration. Angelo is referring
to the place of his own rule, and contrasts what the state of the
law there had been with what it then was : formerly it slept, and
criminals escaped, but now it is awake, and resolves to punish
crimes — ' but here they live to end ;' here crimes live only that they
may be brought to an end." COLLIER.
In a note on the words " Where ? in Genoa ?" Merchant
of Venice, act iii. sc. 1, vol. ii. 518, Mr. Collier observes that
" all the old editions have ' here, in Genoa,' which is evidently
wrong." Again, in a note on the line,
" Where is the best and safest passage in."
First Part of K. Henry VI. act iii. sc. 2, vol. v. 56.
he remarks, " The old copies have ' Here ;' an obvious error
corrected by Howe."
How could Mr. Collier fail to see that the same misprint
had taken place in the present passage ?
SCENE 2. — C. p. 37.
" Not with fond shekels of the tested gold."
" Shakespeare's word may have been ' cycles.'" COLLIER.
I have some difficulty in believing that this conjecture
was seriously proposed.
MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 23
ACT III.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 51 ; K. p. 423.
" Nips youth i' the head, and follies doth enmew
As falcon doth the fowl."
" The old reading is emmew." COLLIER.
And Mr. Collier, I think, ought, like Mr. Knight, to have
retained it : see Richardson's Dictionary and Nares's Gloss.
" In princely guards."
" ' A guard in old language (observes Malone correctly) meant a
welt or border of a garment,' ' because (says Minsheu) it guards and
keeps the garment from tearing.' These guards were afterwards
sometimes taken for ornaments, and the word is so used by Shake-
speare in ' The Merchant of Venice,' act ii. sc. 2." COLLIER.
Not a single passage, I apprehend, could be cited, where
guard, when a garment is spoken of, has any other sense than
that of ornament.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 54.
" Angelo had never the purpose to corrupt her ; only he hath
made an essay of her virtue, to practise his judgment with the dis-
position of natures."
Why alter here the " assay" of the old eds. to "essay"?
Again, in The Comedy of Errors, act v. sc. 1, vol. ii. 168, Mr.
Collier gives " essaying," and in As you like it, act i. sc. 3,
vol. iii. 26, " essay 'd ;" while in All's well that ends well, act
iii. sc. 7, vol. iii. 274, in the First Part of King Henry VI
act v. sc. 4, vol. iv. 329, in the Third Part of King Henry VI.
act i. sc. 4, vol. v. 248, in Hamlet, act iii. sc. 1, vol. vii. 258,
and in other plays, he prints " assay."
ACT IV.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 78.
" Then is there here one Mr. Caper, at the suit of master Three-
pile the mercer Then have we here young Dizzy,
and young Mr. Deep-vow, and Mr. Copper-spur, and Mr. Starve-
lackey," &c.
2 MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
" So printed [' Mr'~\ in the old copies, and probably to be pro-
nounced mister, because when ' Three-pile the mercer ' is mentioned,
he is called master at length : Shakespeare seems to have intended to
make a distinction between gentlemen and tradesmen." COLLIER.
No such distinction was ever dreamed of by Shakespeare.
A hundred passages from early MSS., and as many from early
books, might be adduced to prove that Mr. and Master were
put indiscriminately by transcribers and printers.
In the first folio of Beaumont and Fletcher's Works, among
the headings to the Commendatory Verses, we find ;
" Vpon Mr. John Fletcher's Playes." Sig. b 2.
" On Master John Fletchers Dramatical Poems." Sig. b 3.
" On the Dramatick Poems of Mr. John Fletcher." Sig. c 2.
" Upon the report of the printing of the Dramaticall Poems of
Master John Fletcher." Sig. d.
" To Mr. Francis Beaumont (then living)." Sig. E.
" Upon Master Fletchers Incomparable Playes." Ibid.
A comedy, written by one of Shakespeare's contempo-
raries, furnishes the following passage, — in which Master is
applied both to " gentlemen and tradesmen ; "
" Ruff. What Gallants use to come to your house ?
Fie. All sorts, all nations, and all trades : there is first Master
Gallant your Britaine, Master Metheglins your Welchman, Mounsieur
Mustroome [sic] the Frenchman, Segniour Fumada the Spaniard,
Master Oscabath the Irishman, and Master Shamrough his Lackey ;
O, and Master Slopdragon the Dutchman. Then for your Tradesmen,
there comes first Master Saluberrimum the Physitian, Master Smooth
the silkeman, Master Thimble the Taylor, Master Blade the Cutler,
and Master Rowell the Spurrier ; but Master Match the Gunner of
Tower-hill comes often."
The Fleire (by Sharpham), act iii. sig. F 4, cd. 1610.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 84.
" Ang. In most uneven and distracted manner.
His actions show much like to madness : pray heaven,
His wisdom be not tainted !
And why meet him at the gates, and re- deliver
Our authorities there ?
Escal. I guess not.
MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 25
Ang. And why should we
Proclaim it in an hour before his ent'ring,
That if any crave redress of injustice,
They should exhibit their petitions
In the street ? "
These speeches, which stand good prose in the old eds.,
ought not to have been tortured by Mr. Collier into what is
verse only to the eye.
ACT v.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 99.
" Stand like the forfeits in a barber's shop."
" ' Formerly with us (observes Warburton), the better sort of
people went to the barber's shop to be trimmed, who then practised
the under parts of surgery : so that he had occasion for numerous
instruments, which lay there ready for use ; and the idle people, with
whom his shop was generally crowded, would be perpetually handling
and misusing them. To remedy which, I suppose, there was placed
up against the wall a table of forfeitures adapted to every offence of
this kind ; which, it is not likely, would long preserve its authority.'
This may be true, but it wants proof." COLLIER.
Steevens observes (adloc.) that " the metrical list of forfeits,
published by the late Dr. Kenrick, was a forgery." But it ap-
pears to have been so only in part. " Upwards of forty years
ago," says Moor, " I saw a string of such rules at the tonsor's
of Alderton, near the sea. I well recollect the following lines
to have been among them ; as they are also in those of Nares
\i. e. those cited from Kenrick by Nares in his Gloss.], said to
have been copied in North all ert on, in Yorkshire ;
" First come, first serve — then come not late," &c.
Suffolk Words, 8fC. (1823), p. 133.
THE COMEDY OF ERRORS.
[Vol. ii. COLLIER; vol. i. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 118.
" To seek thy help by beneficial help."
" Perhaps Shakespeare wrote,
' To seek thy hope by beneficial help,'
That is, to seek what you hope by beneficial help to acquire — money
for your ransom." COLLIER.
A very unnecessary conjecture. Malone well observed that
" the jingle has much of Shakespeare's manner."
ACT II.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 131 ; K. p. 157.
" Would' st thou not spit at me, and spurn at me,
And hurl the name of husband in my face,
And tear the stain'd skin off my harlot-brow,
And from my false hand cut the wedding-ring," &c.
Mr. Knight prints ;
" And tear the stain'd skin of my harlot brow;"
observing, "So the folio : Steevens unnecessarily substituted
°F"
Before Mr. Knight publishes a fourth edition of Shake-
speare, he had better read over with attention the following
" Thou, Martius, art so warlike, that thou wouldest cut of the
wish with a sworde." Lyly's Midas, sig. C. ed. 1592.
" Hands of, commaunded Hercules, for horse I am no hay."
Warner's Albions England, p. 57. ed. 1596, ib. ed. 1612.
" Thinkst thou Cleanthes will come agayne to have his head
chopt of so soone as he comes," &c. Chapman's Blinde Begger of
Alexandria, 1598, sig. D 4.
" Take heed the thornes teare not the homes of my Cowe hides,
as thou goest neare the hedges." Heywood's Edward the Fourth
(Part First), sig. E 2. ed. 1619.
THE COMEDY OF ERRORS. 27
" You are a thousand women of [so all the seven old eds.] her
in worth." Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady, act v. sc. 1.
and these, which occur in a single play;
" Sura, I must cast of thy company."
Timon, p. 20 (printed for the Shakespeare Society).
" Stand of." Id. p. 24.
" He putte my shoes of, leaste they make a noyse." Id. p. 39.
" Pull of my doublette." Id. p. 46.
" WeU, cast mee of, I say." Id. p. 49.
" Leaue of complaints." Id. p. 58.
" Shaue q/"th' exorbitant haires of my bearde." Id. p. 62.
" Thy masters daughter hath cast of Timon." Id. p. 70.
" Putte o/fonde feare." Id. p. 71.
" [He puts of his cap" Id. p. 83.
" What, yf shee cast thee of." Id. p. 89.
" Keep then fair league and truce with thy true bed ;
I live disstaind, thou undishonoured."
" i. e. wwstained. The use of the word in this sense is, if not solitary,
very uncommon." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight prints (like Malone) " dis-stain'd" and gives,
without any comment, the gloss — " unstained."
Here all the old eds. have "distain'd:" and it is really
amusing to find the modern editors inventing a new spelling
of the word. If the reader will carefully examine my remarks
at pp. 20, 21, he will be convinced that in the present pas-
sage " distain'd" is a misprint for " unstain'd."
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 140; K. p. 166.
" Bring it, I pray you, to the Porcupine.''
So afterwards, in the next scene (p. 146), Mr. Collier
prints ;
" I thought to have ta'en you at the Porcupine."
and in act v. sc. 1 (pp. 172, 173) ;
" Promising to bring it to the Porcupine."
" Sir, he dined with her, there, at the Porcupine."
28 THE COMEDY OF ERRORS.
again in Sec. Part of Xing Henry FT. ;
" till that his thighs with darts
Were almost like a sharp-quill'd porcupine"
Act iii. sc. 1, vol. v. 162.
in Troilus and Cressida;
" Do not, porcupine, do not."
Act ii. sc. 1, vol. vi. 41.
in Hamlet ;
" Like quills upon the fretful porcupine''
Act i. sc. 5, vol. vii. 223.
without once informing the reader that he has deviated from
the old editions, all of which, both quartos and folios, have
" porpentine" in the passages just adduced. This omission is
the more remarkable, because, in a note on Northbrooke's
Treatise against Dicing, Dancing, Plays, &c. (reprinted for
the Shakespeare Society), where the word "jporkepme" hap-
pens to occur, he observes, " This animal was more usually
called a porpentine^ and so we find it spelt in the old editions
of Shakespeare's Plays, particularly in ' The Comedy of Errors,'
act iii. sc. 2" [why "particularly" in that place, I know not].
p. 186. Now, words are said to be differently " spelt," when,
with different letters, they have the same, or nearly the same
sound: but is this the case with "porcupine" and "porpen-
tine?" do the syllables
cup
pent
make any approach to similarity of sound ? The fact is, " por-
pentine" is a distinct form of the word, which was frequently
employed by the best early writers : so the learned Ascham ;
" Claudiane the poete say th that nature gaue example of shot-
inge first by the porpentine, whiche doth shote his prickes,
and will hitte any thinge that fightes with it." Toxophilus,
fol. 5, ed. 1545. (See also Nares's Gloss, in v.) That Shake-
speare preferred this form, is evident from the agreement of
the old eds. in every one of the passages where the word
occurs.
Mr. Knight's inconsistency is marvellous. In the four
passages of The Comedy of Errors, he prints " Porpentine,"
observing in a note on the second passage, " This word is
THE COMEDY OF ERRORS. 29
invariably used throughout the early editions of Shakspere
for porcupine. It was, no doubt, the familiar word in Shak-
spere's time, and OUGHT NOT TO BE CHANGED ;" in the Sec.
Part of King Henry VI. and in Troilus and Cressida he silently
alters " porpentine " to " porcupine ;" and in Hamlet gives
"porcupine" with a note, — " In all the old copies porpen-
tine"!!!
ACT IV.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 155.
"The man, sir, that, when gentlemen are tired, gives them a
sob, and 'rests them."
" The old copies have sob, perhaps misprinted for ' fob/ which is
the word preferred by modern editors." COLLIER.
As Mr. Collier retained " sob" he ought to have explained
what it means in this passage.
ACT v.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 173 ; K. p. 197.
" I never came within these abbey walls,
Nor ever did'st thou draw thy sword on me.
I never saw the chain, so help me heaven !
And this is false you burden me withal."
So the passage stands in all the modern editions, — not
only with wrong punctuation, but with an obvious misprint.
The last line of this speech, as Mr. Collier himself ob-
serves, is " a repetition of an expression previously used by
Adriana,"
" So befal my soul,
As this is false he burdens me withal."
The passage ought to stand thus ;
" I never came within these abbey- walls ;
Nor ever did'st thou draw thy sword on me ;
I never saw the chain. So help me heaven,
As this is false you burden me withal !"
30 THE COMEDY OF ERRORS.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 178 ; K. p. 200.
" Twenty-five years have I but gone in travail
Of you, my sons ; and 'till this present hour
My heavy burden wwdelivered."
" The folios have this line —
' My heavy burden are delivered ;'
which must be an error of the press. The meaning of ^Emilia is,
that she considers she has gone in travail with her twin sons twenty-
five years, and that till this present hour her heavy burden had been
undelivered. Malone thought fit to alter ' and 'till,' in the preceding
line, to until, and substituted ' not delivered* for ' are delivered ;' but
the only change required is un for are, which was a very easy mis-
print." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight adopts Theobald's alteration of the passage,
thus ;
" nor, till this present hour,
My heavy burthens [so sec. folio] are delivered."
The misprint of " are delivered" for " wwdelivered," which
Mr. Collier calls " a very easy " one, appears to me altogether
unlikely to have occurred. As to the reading given by Mr.
Knight, — it is very objectionable, because there is no reason
for believing that " and " is a misprint.
I have little doubt that the genuine text is ;
" and till this present hour
My heavy burthen ne'er delivered."
Our early printers sometimes mistook "ne'er" (written nere)
for are.
31
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.
[Vol. ii. COLLIER ; vol. ii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 195.
" If I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat, and shoot at me ; and
he that hits me, let him be clapped on the shoulder, and called Adam."
" When Benedick says that he who hits him is to be ' called
Adam,' the allusion may be to the famous outlaw and archer Adam
Bell ; or perhaps the meaning only is, that the person who hit the
bottle was to be called, by way of distinction, the first man, i. e.
Adam." COLLIER.
" The first man!"* Can Mr. Collier discover the same
antediluvian allusion in
" Young Adam Cupid, he that shot so trim,
When King Cophetua lov'd the beggar-maid" ?
Romeo and Juliet, act ii. sc. 1, vol. vi. 405.
In the passage just cited, Mr. Knight retains the reading
of the old eds. ;
" Young Abraham Cupid," &c.
and says, " The * Abraham' Cupid is the cheat — the * Abra-
ham man' — of our old statutes." But, though Abraham-man
was doubtless a cant term for a particular description of va-
gabond, who ever heard of Abraham, without the addition
man, being used to convey the meaning which Mr. Knight
would make it bear ? " Adam" is the excellent emendation
of Upton. The progress of error in the old copies is plain
enough : proper names being often written with abbreviations,
* Since writing the above, I have traced Mr. Collier's explanation to a joke
made upon, and greatly admired by, the old doting steward Adam Winterton, in
Colman's Iron Chest ;
11 Od ! he's a merry man ! and does so jest !
He calls me FIRST OF MEN, 'CAUSE MY NAME'S ADAM.
Well! 'tis exceeding pleasant, by St. Thomas!'1
Act ii. sc. 4.
32 MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.
the original MS. had {(Ad." which afterwards was changed to
" Ab." and eventually became " Abraham"
SCENE 3.— C. p. 200.
" What is he, for a fool, that betroths himself to unquietness ?"
This improper punctuation seems to shew that the expres-
sion was not understood. " What is he for a fool" is equi-
valent to — What manner of fool is he,— What fool is he?
See Gifford's note on B. Jonson's Works, iii. 397.
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 208.
" You shall find her the infernal Ate* in good apparel."
" ' This is a pleasant allusion/ says Warburton, ' to the custom
of ancient poets and painters, who represent the furies in rags."
COLLIER.
Ate, as Steevens observes, and as every school -boy knows,
was not a Fury.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 215.
" We'll fit the kid-fox with a penny-worth."
" So the old editions ; but perhaps ' kid' is a misprint for hid,
as Benedick says, ' I'll hide me in the arbour.' If ' kid' be the cor-
rect reading, it is to be taken either in the sense of known or disco-
vered, or as meaning a young fox." COLLIER.
It is strange that Mr. Collier should have been so mis-
led by Grey's note on the line as to suppose for a moment
that " kid " in this compound could possibly be the past par-
ticiple of the old verb kith. " Kid-fox" means a young fox.
Richardson in his valuable Dictionary cites the present pas-
\ sage under the substantive kid.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 224.
" ffrs. But are you sure
That Benedick loves Beatrice so entirely ?
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. 33
Hero. So says the prince, and my new-trothed lord.
Urs. And did they bid her tell you of it, madam ?
Hero. They did intreat me to acquaint her of it," &c.
Here Mr. Collier's printer has followed the text of Ma-
lone's last edition, where the words " you" and " her" are by
mistake transposed, to the destruction of the sense. Read, of
course,
" And did they bid you tell her of it, madam ?"
ACT IV.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 253.
" Dogb. Write down — that they hope they serve God: — and
write God first; for God defend but God should go before such
villains !"
" The part of Dogberry's speech which precedes these words
['before such villains'], and the answer of Conrade and Borachio,
which produced Dogberry's speech, are omitted in the folio, 1623,
in consequence, perhaps, as Blackstone suggests, of the stat. «i
Jac. I. c. 21, against the profane employment of the name of the
Creator. The whole passage might be an interpolation by the
actors, and it might therefore be excluded in the folio." COLLIER.
An interpolation of the actors ! No, no. Such inimit-
able blundering could have been put into the mouth of Dog-
berry by Shakespeare alone.
ACT v.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 265.
" This naughty man
Shall face to face be brought to Margaret,
Who, I believe, was pact in all this wrong,
Hir'd to it by your brother."
" ' Pact' is properly bargain or contract, and Margaret, one party
to the ' pact,' is spoken of as the contract itself. The common, but
erroneous, reading is the verb packed." COLLIER.
The spelling in the old eds., " packt" might alone have
shewn Mr. Collier that the word was a participle, — pack'd
D
34 MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.
(which Malone rightly explains " combined, an accomplice"),
even if we suppose that, when he made this rash alteration,
he had entirely forgotten the following passages of Shake-
speare ;
" The goldsmith there, were he not pack'd with her,
Could witness it, for he was with me then."
Com. of Errors, act v. sc. 1, vol. ii. 172.
" Here's packing, with a witness, to deceive us all."
Tarn, of the Shrew, act v. sc. 1, vol. iii. 192.
" Go pack with him, and give the mother gold."
Titus Andron. act iv. sc. 2, vol. vi. 334.
Compare Massinger ;
" Our packing being laid open."
The Great Duke of Florence, act iii. sc. 1 .
" *. e.," says Gifford, " our insidious contrivance, our iniquit-
ous collusion to deceive the duke : so the word is used by
Shakespeare, and others." Works, ii. 485, ed. 1813.
Many examples of the word might be adduced from
earlier writers : Skelton has ;
" But ther was fals packing, or els I am begylde."
Upon the dethe of the Erie of Northumberlande, —
Works, i. 9, ed. Dyce.
See also Richardson's Diet, in v. Pack, where the present
passage of Shakespeare is cited.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 271 ; K. p. 453.
" Hang thou there upon the tomb,
Praising her when I am dumb."
" This is the reading of the folio, which is, probably, right. The
4to has dead for ' dumb.'" COLLIER.
" Probably right !" Why, even if all the old eds. had
" dead," the rhyme would be sufficient to prove that Shake-
speare must have written " dumb."
" Midnight, assist our moan ;
Help us to sigh and groan,
Heavily, heavily:
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. 35
Graves, yawn, and yield your dead,
Till death be uttered,
Heavily, heavily."
The folio gives the last line, " Heavenly, heavenly " which
Mr. Collier thinks " may be right ;" and which Mr. Knight
adopts, telling us that the meaning is " Death is expelled
heavenly — by the power of heaven."
A speech of Hamlet, act ii. sc. 2, stands thus in the folio ;
" I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth,
forgone all custome of exercise; and indeed, it goes so heauenly
with my disposition, that this goodly frame the Earth seemes to me
a sterill Promontory," &c.
Now, in the former passage " Heavenly" is as certainly a
misprint for " Heavily," as it is in the latter.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 276.
" Leon. Peace ! I will stop your mouth."
" Modern editors assign this line to Benedick ; but all the old
copies give it to Leonato. It may be very well also, as a piece of
stage effect, to make Benedick kiss Beatrice at this juncture, but
there is no warrant for it in any old stage -direction." COLLIER.
In the first place, the context shews that the speech be-
longs to Benedick : why should Leonato wish to put Beatrice
suddenly to silence? she has said nothing which concerns
him. Secondly, it is as evident that the speaker of these
words kisses Beatrice, as that Young Loveless kisses the
Widow when his brother desires him to " stop her mouth ;"
" Widow. Sir, you speak like a worthy brother :
And so much I do credit your fair language
That I shall love your brother ; and so love him —
But I shall blush to say more.
Elder Loveless. Stop her mouth."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady, act iii. sc. 2.
Passages might be cited from various other old plays,
in which "mouths are stopt" by the same process. But,
after all, it is unnecessary to wander away from Shakespeare
for an instance of it, since in Troilus and Cressida, when
36 MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.
Cressicla says, " Stop my mouth," we learn distinctly from the
lady's next speech how Troilus understood her injunction, —
" My lord, I do beseech you, pardon me ;
'Twas not my purpose, thus to beg a kiss."
Act iii. sc. 2, vol. vi. 71.
37
LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST.
[Vol. ii. COLLIER ; Vol. i. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 287.
" And, though I have for barbarism spoke more,
Than for that angel knowledge you can say,
Yet confident I'll keep what I have sworne,
And bide the penance of each three years' day."
" So the old 4to, 1598, and the folio, 1623. The folio, 1632,
substitutes swore for the sake of the rhyme, which may have been
intended." COLLIER.
" May have been intended ! "
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 309 ; K. p. 245.
" I'll give you Aquitain, and all that is his,
An you give him for my sake but one loving kiss.
Prin. Come to our pavilion : Boyet is dispos'd —
Boyet. But to speak that in words, which his eye hath dis-
clos'd."
Among Mr. Collier's Additional Notes and Corrections
(vol. i. cclxxxv.) we find ;
" ' Boyet is dispos'd.' Some persons would discover an indelicate
meaning here, in the use of the verb ' dispos'd ;' but, surely, prurient
ingenuity was never more misplaced, as is shown by the context."
Though Mr. Collier uses the term " some persons," he al-
ludes to the following note of mine in Beaumont and Fletcher's
Works, iv. 193, and to that only ;
" dispos'd} Is explained by Weber ' merry ;' but it means some-
thing more, viz. wantonly merry, inclined to wanton mirth. The
word occurs, with the same meaning, in several of these plays : com-
pare also Loves Labour's lost, act ii. sc. 1 ;
38 LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST.
' Prin. Come, to our pavilion : Boyet is dispos'd.
Boyct. But to speak that in words, which his eye hath disclos'd.'
a passage which has not been understood by the modern editors of
Shakespeare ; for (in opposition to the old eds.) they put a break
after ' dispos'd,' as if the sentence were incomplete."
Now, where is the grossly indelicate meaning which Mr.
Collier's remark would naturally lead one to suppose that I
had assigned to the word ? Boyet having said,
" I'll give you Aquitain and all that is his,
An you give him for my sake but one loving kiss,"
the Princess, thinking (as she well might) that he was talking
a little too freely, addresses her ladies with
" Come, to our pavilion : Boyet is dispos'd,"
(i. e. is inclined to wanton mirth, using such language as we
ought not to hear), though Boyet, choosing to understand
" dispos'd" simply in the sense of * inclined,' immediately adds,
" But to speak that in words, which his eye hath disclos'd."
That such is the meaning of " dispos'd" in the Princess's
speech is put beyond all possibility of doubt by the following
passages, — which are only a few of those that might be ad-
duced ;
" LongsJi. Say any thing but so.
Once, Nell, thou gav'st me this.
Q. Elinor. I pray, let go ;
Ye are dispos'd, I think.
Longsh. Ay, madam ; very well."
Edward /.,— Peek's Works, i. 125, ed. 1829.
" Rut. You love a gentlewoman, a young handsome woman ;
I have lov'd a thousand, not so few.
Arn. You are dispos'd.
Rut. You hope to marry her," &c.
Beaumont and Fletcher's Custom of the Country,
act i. sc. 1 .
" Vol. . . . My nurse ! yes, you shall rock me :
Widow, I'll keep you waking.
L. Heart. You are dispos'd, sir.
Vol. Yes, marry, am I, widow," &c.
Beaumont and Fletcher's Wit without Money,
act v. sc. 4.
LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. 39
" CM. No ;
I'll make you no such promise.
Clau. If you do, sir,
Take heed you stand to't.
Chi. Wondrous merry ladies !
Lucina. The wenches are disposd. — Pray, keep your way, sir."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Valentinian, act ii. sc. 4.
" Fran. Who would you speak withal ?
NIC. Your mistress, little one.
Fran. Do you know her, sir ?
Nic. No ; but I would know her ; that's the business : I mean
the musical gentlewoman that was fidling and so many [sic] in the
what-doe-call't een now.
Fran. What-doe-call her, sir, I pray ?
Nic. What-doe-call her ! 'tis not come to that yet ; prethee let
me see and speak with her first.
Fran. You are disposed, I think.
Nic. What should we doe here else ?"
Brome's Covent- Garden weeded, p. 12, — Five New
Playes, 1659.
ACT IV.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 341.
" O paradox ! Black is the badge of hell,
The hue of dungeons, and the scowl of night."
" This is also Theobald's emendation. The old copies have ' the
school of night.' Capell prints ' stole of night.' " COLLIER.
Theobald's conjecture was " stole :" we owe " scowl" (a
much worse one) to Warburton.
Qy. is the true reading ascertained by the following lines,
with which Chapman commences his Humorous Dayes Myrth,
1599?
" Yet hath the morning sprinckled throwt [sic] the clowdes
But halfe her tincture, and the soyle of night
Stickes stil vpon the bosome of the ayre."
(The passage just cited is printed as prose in the old ed.)
Supposing that in the MS. of Love's Labour's lost, the word
"soil" was spelt, as in Chapman's play, "soyle," it might
40 LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST.
easily become " school" in the printed copy, the compositor
mistaking so for «?, and y for h,— the letter h being formerly
written under the line.
In Midsummer-Night's Dream., act i. sc. 1, we find ;
" Brief as the lightning in the collied [i. e. soiled, — black] night."
Besides, the substantive soil is repeatedly used by Shake-
speare.
ACT v.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 355.
" The effect of my intent is, to cross theirs :
They do it but in mockery, merriment ;
And mock for mock is only my intent."
" The folio reads ' mocking merriment.' " COLLIER.
And the folio, as the other modern editors saw, is obviously
right.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 356 ; K. p. 290.
" Moth. ' All hail, the richest beauties on the earth !'
Biron. Beauties no richer than rich taffata.
Moth. ' A holy parcel of the fairest dames,
[The Ladies turn their backs to him.
That ever turn'd their backs to mortal views !'
Biron. ' Their eyes,' villain, ' their eyes.'
Moth. * That ever turn'd their eyes to mortal views !
Out—'
Boyet. True ; ' out,' indeed.
Moth. ' Out of your favours, heavenly spirits, vouchsafe
Not to behold'—
Biron. ' Once to behold,' rogue."
" This line [' Beauties no richer than rich taffata'], the folios and
quarto give to Biron ; not to Boyet, as in all the modern editions.
There is no sufficient reason for depriving him of it." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight also thinks the old prefix right ; Biron, he
says, " is vexed at finding the ladies masked, and sees nothing
' richer than rich taffata.' "
To me it is evident that the line belongs to Boyet, who
LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. 41
here, as afterwards, catches at the words of Moth, in order to
confuse him : at p. 363 the king exclaims,
" A blister on his [i. e. Boyet's] sweet tongue, with my heart,
That put Armado's page out of his part ! "
Biron, as the context shews, is now attending only to Moth, —
full of anxiety that the address may be correctly spoken.
As prefixes frequently consisted only of initial letters, how
likely that Boyet and Biron should be confounded !
SCENE 2.— C. p. 363.
" Biron. See where it comes ! — Behaviour, what wert thou,
Till this man show'd thee ? and what art thou now ?"
" The old copies have it, * Till this mad man show'd thee?'
There is no reason for calling Boyet a mad man, though there might
be some for terming him a made man, — i. e. a man made up and com-
pleted as Biron has just before described him. However, mad seems
to have crept injuriously into the text by an error of the compositor."
COLLIER.
I have some doubts whether "mad" (though it makes the
line over-measure) ought to be rejected : an epithet to " man"
seems necessary here; and surely "mad" may be understood
in another sense than ' lunatic ;' Biron afterwards taxes Boyet
with "jesting merrily" (p. 368), and calls him "old mocker"
(p. 371). As to " a made man" — Mr. Collier ought to have
known that, in Shakespeare's time, the expression meant only
' a man whose fortune is made,' ( a fortunate man ;'
" You're a made old man."
The Winters Tale, act iii. sc. 3, vol. iii. 484.
" If I had never seen, or never tasted,
The goodness of this kix, I had been a made man."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Coxcomb, act i. sc. 2.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 372 ; K. p. 304.
" Hoi. ' Great Hercules is presented by this imp,
Ergo, I come with this apology. —
LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST.
Keep some state in thy exit, and vanish. [Exit MOTH.
Hoi. ' Judas I am/ — "
Why is the prefix " Hoi" repeated ?
SCENE 2.— C. p. 374.
" Arm. ' The armipotent Mars, of lances the almighty,
Gave Hector a gift, — '
Dum. A gift nutmeg.
Biron. A lemon.
Long. Stuck with cloves."
" The folio has ' a gilt nutmeg/ which may be right ; but ' a gift
nutmeg/ the reading of the 4to, is perfectly intelligible." COLLIER.
Is there any excuse for thrusting back such nonsense into
the text? " A gift nutmeg" is a mere misprint, the com-
positor's eye having caught the word " gift " in the preceding
line.
Steevens observes (ad loc.) that " a gilt nutmeg is men-
tioned in Jonson's Masque of Christmas" — which is not true.
But that it was a common gift might be shewn from various
passages in our early writers : e. g.
" Against my Birth- day thou shalt be my guest :
Weele haue Greene-cheeses, and fine Silly-bubs ;
And thou shalt be the chiefe of all my feast :
And I will giue thee two fine pretie Cubs,
With two yong Whelps, to make thee sport withall,
A golden Racket, and a Tennis-ball,
A guilded Nutmeg and a race of Ginger,
A silken Girdle and a drawn-worke Band,
Cuffs for thy wrists, a gold Ring for thy finger,
And sweet Rose-water for thy Lilly" white hand,
A Purse of silke, bespangd with spots of gold,
As braue a one as ere thou didst behold."
Barnfield's Affectionate Shepheard, 1594, sig. C ii.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 378 ; K. p. 309.
Formed by the eye, and, therefore, like the eye,
Full of straying shapes, of habits, and of forms,
LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. 43
Varying in subjects, as the eye doth roll
To every varied object in his glance."
" All the old copies read — ' Full of stray ing shapes.' Coleridge (Lit.
Rem. ii. 110) recommends the substitution of stray for 'straying;'
M alone and others have strange ; but it is easy to read ' straying,' if
necessary, in the time of one syllable." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight adopts Coleridge's " stray."
Now, it is very certain, though neither Mr. Collier nor Mr.
Knight seem to be aware of the fact, that our early printers
frequently blundered, as they have done here, in the word
" strange." The old eds. of Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest
Mans Fortune (act iii. sc. 3) have, " Well, these are standing
creatures," &c., where (even if the old MS. copy of that play
in my possession did not correct the error) there could be no
doubt from the context that "standing" was a misprint for
" strange."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 379.
" Then, at the expiration of the year,
Come challenge me, challenge me by these deserts,
And by this virgin palm, now kissing thine,
I will be thine ; and, till that instance, shut
My woful self up in a mourning house/' &c.
" ' Instance' is elsewhere used by Shakespeare for solicitation,
and that is the sense here : the folio substitutes instant. The Princess
refers to the claim the king is to make of her hand at the end of the
year." COLLIER.
The " instance" of the 4to is nothing more than a misprint
for " instante." No editor, except Mr. Collier, has ever sup-
posed for a moment that " instance" could be right ; nor will
any future editor suppose so.
44
MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.
[Vol. ii. COLLIER ; vol. ii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 391.
" Four days will quickly steep themselves in nights ;
Four nights will quickly dream away the time ;
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
Now bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities."
" The old copies, 4to and folio, are uniform in this reading :
Rowe changed 'now' to new, but surely without necessity. The
meaning of Hippolyta is, that ' then the moon, which is now bent in
heaven like a silver bow, shall behold the night of our solemnities/
Astronomically the alteration does not seem called for ; because, else-
where in this act, we find that the nights were moonlight at the time
when Hippolyta is speaking. In this restoration I am glad to fortify
myself by the opinion of Mr. Amyot." COLLIER.
"Now" for "new" is one of the commonest misprints;
and that it has taken place here I have not the smallest doubt.
Hazlitt well observes, that our great dramatist " has a magic
power over words: they come winged at his bidding; and
seem to know their places" (Lectures on Eng. Poets, p. 103,
ed. 1841). If Shakespeare had written " Now," intending the
passage to have the meaning which Mr. Collier gives it, I feel
convinced that he would have adopted a different collocation
of the words.
Which reading may be right " astronomically," I do not
presume to determine : I leave the discussion of that point to
Mr. Collier and Sir John Herschel.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 398; K. p. 18.
" O then, what graces in my love do dwell,
That he hath turn'd a heaven into hell !"
" Fisher's 4to has ' unto a hell,' instead of ' into hell.' " COLLIER.
The context, " a heaven," is quite enough to determine
MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM. 45
that the reading of Fisher's 4to, "unto a hell" (which Mr.
Knight gives), is the right one, excepting that " unto" should
be " into." Compare a well-known passage of Milton ;
" The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven."
Par. Lost, b. i. 254.
ACT II.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 403.
" Enter a Fairy and PucK/rom opposite sides."
" The old stage-direction partakes of the simplicity of our early
theatres. The scene is obviously laid in a wood, but the representa-
tives of the Fairy and Puck are said to enter at different ' doors/ the
wood being, probably, supposed." COLLIER.
Again, on the stage-direction in The Third Part of K.
Henry VI. , act ii. sc. 4, vol. v. 266, —
" Excursions. Enter RICHARD and CLIFFORD," —
Mr. Collier remarks,
" Although the scene was supposed to represent a field of battle,
the old stage- direction in ' The True Tragedy' is, ' Alarums, and then
enter Richard at one door, and Clifford at another.' "
These are indeed strange notes. The doors refer to the
actual stage-locality, not to the scene supposed to be repre-
sented.
"Or Player-like, come forth to acte their parts ;
Speake bigge and strut, and stride Colossus like,
And when his turne is out, steps in at dore."
Belchier's Hans Seer-pot, His Invisible
Comedie, &c., 1618, last page.
In the First Part of Mrs. Behn's Hover, or the Banished
Cavaliers, which was acted when the theatre was fully sup-
plied with scenery, we find,
" Act ii. Scene 1. THE LONG STREET;"
and presently after, during that scene,
" Enter at one Door Don Pedro, Stephano, Don Antonio and
Diego at the other Door with People following him in Masquerade,'
&c.
46 MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.
So, too, in many other comparatively modern plays.
More than one editor of early dramas has mistaken the
meaning of door in the stage-directions. According to the
old copies of Beaumont and Fletcher's Wit without Money,
act iii. sc. 4, Luce enters, and " lays a suit and letter at the
door [i. e. at the stage-door, at the side of the stage] ; ac-
cording to Weber's ed., she " lays a suit and letter at a house
door"!!
SCENE 1.— C. p. 407.
" And make him with fair JEgU break his faith."
" All the old copies read Eagles for JEgU" COLLIER.
Mr. Collier ought to have added the reason why the old
copies read so ; viz., because in Shakespeare's time it was not
uncommon to use the genitive of proper names for the nomi-
native. At an earlier period, this practice prevailed almost
universally. Even in a modem book, and the work of a
scholar, we find, " a natural grotto, more beautiful than
^Elian's description of Atalanta's, or that in Homer, where
Calypsos lived." Amory's Life of John Buncle, vol. i. 214,
ed. 1756.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 408 ; K. p. 32.
" hoary-headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose ;
And on old Hyem's chin, and icy crown,
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set."
On this passage, — where of course " Hyem's" ought to be
printed " Hyenas'," — Mr. Collier has no note; neither, to my
surprise, has Mr. Knight.
It was the opinion of Stephen "Weston that Shakespeare
must have derived " this peculiar image of Hyems' chin " from
a translation of
" turn flumina mento
" Precipitant senis, et glacie riget horrida barba."
Mn. iv. 250.
Malone, on the other hand, supposed that " this singular
MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM. 47
image" was suggested to the poet by the following lines of
Golding's Ovid;
" And lastly, quaking for the colde, stood Winter all forlorne,
With rugged head as white as doue, and garments all to torne,
Forladen with the isycles, that dangling [dangled] vp and downe
Vpon his gray and hoarie beard and snowie frozen crowne"
Metam. b. ii. p. 15, ed. 1567.
Now, in good truth, there is not the slightest resemblance
between these two quotations and the absurdity which they
are adduced to illustrate and defend. When Virgil describes
Atlas with rivers streaming from his chin, and when Ovid
paints Winter with icicles dangling on his beard and crown,
we have such pictures presented to us as the imagination not
-unwillingly receives ; but Hyems with a chaplet of summer
buds on his CHIN is a grotesque which must surely startle even
the dullest reader.
" What child," says Giiford, " does not see that the line in
Midsummer-Night's Dream should be,
' And on old Hyems' thin and icy crown/ "
Note on Shirley's Works, iii. 515.
This correction, requiring only the change of a single letter,
had been long ago proposed by Tyrwhitt.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 427.
" Their sense thus weak, lost with their fears thus strong,
Made senseless, things begin to do them wrong,
For briers and thorns at their apparel snatch," &c.
Why has Mr. Collier put a comma after " senseless ?" which
is evidently an epithet belonging to "things"
SCENE 2.— C. p. 431.
" O, let me kiss
This princess of pure white, this seal of bliss !"
" It may be doubted from the context whether impress were not
Shakespeare's word." COLLIER.
48 MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.
When Mr. Collier offered the very unnecessary conjecture
" impress" on account of " the context" ("seal"), he did not
perceive that these two rapturous encomiums on the hand of
Helena have no connexion with each other. Demetrius terms
it " princess of pure white," because its whiteness exceeded all
other whiteness ; and " seal of bliss," because it was to confirm
the happiness of her accepted lover.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 446.
" Obe
Titania, music call ; and strike more dead
Than common sleep of all these five the sense.
Tita. Music, ho ! music ! such as charmeth sleep.
Puck. Now, when thou wak'st, with thine own fool's eyes peep.
Obe. Sound, music ! Come, my queen, take hands with me,
And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be."
"After these words [ — 'music! such as charmeth sleep'] in the
folio, 1623, we have the stage -direction ' Music still ;' which means,
probably, that the music was to cease before Puck spoke, as Oberon
afterwards exclaims, ' Sound, music !' when it was to be renewed."
COLLIER.
" Music still" is nothing more than Still music : compare
a stage-direction in Beaumont and Fletcher's Triumph of Time
(Four Plays in One), where, according to the old eds., the
epithet applied to " Trumpets" is put last ; " Jupiter and Mer-
cury descend severally. Trumpets small above."
The Music, instead of " ceasing before Puck spoke," was
not intended to commence at all till Oberon had said,
" Sound, music !" The stage-direction here (as we frequently
find in early editions of plays, see my remarks on Troilus and
Cressida, act i. sc. 2), was placed prematurely, to warn the
musicians to be in readiness.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 447 ; K. p. 76.
" I was with Hercules, and Cadmus, once,
When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear
With hounds of Sparta."
MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM. 49
In spite of what the commentators say (see Far. Shake-
speare)) I am strongly inclined to think that " bear" is a mis-
print for " boar."
" The. My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
So flew'd, so sanded."
" ' So sanded' may refer to the sandy marks on the dogs, or
possibly it is a misprint for sounded, in allusion to their mouths."
COLLIER.
Did Mr. Collier really believe that " sounded " could be
used in the sense of ' having, or giving forth, a sound ?' Be-
sides, the earlier portion of this speech is entirely occupied
by a description of the appearance and make of the hounds
("sanded" denoting their general colour) ; in a later part of
it, Theseus describes their cry, — " match'd in mouth like
bells."
ACT V.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 462 ; K. p. 89.
" Sweet moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams ;
I thank thee, moon, for shining now so bright,
For, by thy gracious, golden, glittering streams,
I trust to take of truest Thisby sight."
" The old [oldest] copies repeat beams, as the rhyme to the same
word in the line next but one preceding it ; and the editor of the
second folio substituted streams, perhaps upon some then existing
authority which we have no right to dispute ; but it appears more
likely, from the alliteration, that the word written by Shakespeare
was ' gleams/ which is quite as applicable to moonlight. I owe
this suggestion to Mr. Knight's ' Pictorial Shakspere.' " COLLIER.
The editor of the second folio gave here what Shakespeare
undoubtedly wrote. Neither Mr. Knight nor Mr. Collier
appears to recollect that from the earliest times stream has \
been frequently used in the sense of ' ray ;'
" And firy Phebus riseth up so bright
That all the orient laugheth of the sight,
^ ct_^A
50 MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.
And with his stremes drieth in the greves
The silver dropes, hanging on the leves."
Chaucer's Knightes Tale, v. 1495, ed. Tyrwhitt.
" For with the stremes of her eyen clere
I am wounded euen to the hert."
Lydgate's Temple of Glas, sig. b iii. ed. 4to, n. d.
"Awake anone & loke vpon the light
Of thylke sterre that with her lemys bryght
And wyth the shynyng of his [sic] stremes merye
Is wont to glade al our emysperye."
Lydgate's Lyfe of our Lady, st. 1. Caxton's ed. n. d.
" And Marcury he trewe downe his golden bemes
And [He]sperus her syluer stremes."
CocJce Lorelles Bote, n. d. sig. c ii.
" like sunny beames,
That in a cloud their light did long time stay,
Their vapour vaded, shewe their golden gleames,
And through the azure aire shoote forth their persant streames."
Spenser's Faerie Queene, b. iii. c. ix. 20.
(In all the editions of Spenser the last line is erroneously
printed> faM
" And through the persant aire shoote forth their azure streames ;"
that sagacious commentator, Church, informing us, that
' through the persant aire ' means ' piercing through the
air ' ! ! ! and, we may presume, seeing nothing remarkable in
the rays of the sun being described as azure ! ! /)
" Resembling Titan in his hottest streames,
Euen in the glory of his summer gleames."
Cutwode's Caltha Poetarum, 1599, st. 18.
" Lett a dire comett with his blazing streames" &c.
Timon, a play, p. 80 (printed for the Shakespeare Soc.).
" Amongst all those he [Phcebus] makes his choice,
And with delight goes thorough,
With radiant beams and silver streams
O'er Leader-Haughs and Yarrow."
Scottish Song,— Leader-Haughs and Yarrow.
" The Day breaks here, and yon sun-flaring stream
Shot from the south."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Maid's Tragedy, act i. sc. 2.
MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM. 51
(where the Editors of 1778 and Weber, having, like Mr. Col-
lier and Mr. Knight, an unreasonable objection to "stream,"
substituted " beam ").
Even in Fielding we find ; " The day now began to send
forth its first streams of light." Tom Jones (conclusion of
b. viii.), vol. ii. 284, ed. 1763.
Shakespeare uses the verb stream, in the sense of ' pour
forth rays ;'
" her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright,
That birds would sing, and think it were not night."
Romeo and Juliet, act ii. sc. 2.
MERCHANT OF VENICE.
[Vol. ii. COLLIER; Vol. ii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 485 ; K. p. 262.
" Come, Nerissa. — Sirrah, go before. — Whiles we shut the gate
upon one wooer, another knocks at the door."
Mr. Knight gives the passage thus ;
" Come, Nerissa. Sirrah, go before.
Whiles we shut the gate upon one wooer, another knocks at
the door.'
and remarks, that " the doggrel line is not inconsistent with the
playfulness of the preceding dialogue." He is doubtless right.
Many passages might be cited to shew that our early drama-
tists frequently, at the end of a scene, make a prose speech
conclude with a couplet, the first line of which is much shorter
than the second.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 487; K. p. 264.
" If I can catch him once upon the hip," &c.
Mr. Knight observes;
" We have the same expression in Othello ;
* I'll have our Michael Cassio on the hip.'
Johnson says the expression is taken from the practice of wrestling."
But in his Dictionary Johnson derives the phrase (and
with more probability) from hunting ; " the hip or haunch
of a deer being the part commonly seized by the dogs."
The commentators are evidently at a loss for an example
of this phrase in some other writer. The following passages
may be cited ;
" When Dauid seem'd, in common sence, already on the hip,
Was Absolom himselfe ore-throne," &c.
Warner's Albions England, p. 262. ed. 1596.
MERCHANT OF VENICE. 53
" You would have vs vppon thipp, would you?" Sir Thomas
More, a play,— MS. Hart 7368, fol. 8.
" And Michaels Terme, lawes haruest, now begins,
Where many losers are, and few that wins ;
For law may well be cal'd contentions whip,
When for a scratch, a cuffe, for pointes or pins,
Will witlesse gets his neighbour on the hip."
Anagrams and Sonnets, p. 256, — Taylor's Workes, ed. 1630,
" He had got me o' the hip once ; it shall go hard
But he shall find his own coin."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Bonduca, act v. sc. 2.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 489.
" In the Rialto."
" At the commencement of Act iii., Shakspeare alters the expres-
sion to ' on the Rialto.' " COLLIER.
When Mr. Collier wrote this note, he had forgotten that in
the present scene we have had already " upon the Rialto" and
" on the Rialto" (p. 486).
" Rialto is the name, not of the bridge, but of the island from
which it is called ; and the Venetians say il ponte di Rialto, as we
say Westminster-bridge. In that island is the exchange ; and I have
often walked there as on classic ground. In the days of Antonio and
Bassanio it was second to none It was there that the Christian
held discourse with the Jew ; and Shylock refers to it when he says,
Signor Antonio, many a time and oft
In the Rialto you have rated me," &c.
Note on Rogers's Italy, p. 254, ed. 1830.
ACT II.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 499 ; K. p. 280.
" lest through thy wild behaviour,
I be misconstrued in the place I go to,
And lose my hopes."
Again, Mr. Collier prints, in As you like it ;
" That he misconstrues all that you have done."
Act i. sc. 2, vol. iii. 21.
54 MERCHANT OF VENICE.
and in the First Part of King Henry VI. ;
" Be not dismay 'd, fair lady ; nor misconstrue
The mind of Talbot," &c.
Act ji. sc. 3, vol. v. 38.
But since in these three passages the old eds. agree in reading
" misconster'd," " misconsters," and " misconster," no altera-
tion ought to have been made.
The form misconster is common in our early writers ;
" But did misconster what the prophet told."
TheRaigne of King Edward the Third, sig. K 2, ed. 1596.
" Do not misconster my true meaning heart."
Grim, the Collier of Croydon (near the end of
act ii.), p. 37, ed. 1662 (a date long pos-
terior to the composition of the play) .
" Misconster not, I meant your grace no hurt."
The Weakest goeth to the Wall, sig. F 2, ed. 1618.
Mr. Knight, inconsistently, gives " misconstrued" in The
Merchant of Venice, and " misconstrues" in As you like it;
while he retains " misconster" in the First Part of K. Henry
VI. , observing, " so the original : it is ordinarily printed mis-
construe"
SCENE 3.— C. p. 500 ; K. p. 281.
" If a Christian do not play the knave, and get thee, I am much
deceived."
" The two quartos and the first folio agree in this reading, and
the meaning may be, ' if a Christian do not play the knave and obtain
thee' &c. ; but very possibly ' do' was misprinted for did, and in that
case the meaning would not be disputable : the second folio has did."
COLLIER.
Notwithstanding Malone's elaborate defence of " do," I
have no doubt that " did" (which Mr. Knight gives) is the
right reading. Launcelot plainly means that he cannot be-
lieve Jessica to be Shylock's daughter.
SCENE 7.— C. p. 507 ; K. p. 287.
The one of them contains my picture, prince :
If you choose that, then I am yours with all."
MERCHANT OF VENICE. 55
What ! "with all" (all that I possess) ? — O, no ! — Read,
•with Mr. Knight and the other modern editors, " withal."
SCENE 9.— C. p. 514.
" Enter a Messenger.
Mess. Where is my lady ?
Por. Here ; what would my lord ? "
" This is the stage- direction in all the old copies, for which mo-
dern editors have substituted ' Enter a Servant.' It is clear that he
was not a mere servant, not only from the language put into his
mouth, but because, when he asks, ' Where is my lady ? ' Portia re-
plies, ' Here ; what would my lord ?' The Messenger was a person of
rank attending on Portia." COLLIER.
Portia was not herself of sufficient rank to have " persons
of rank" among her attendants. Her reply,
" Here-, what would my lord?"
is nothing more than a sportive rejoinder to the abrupt excla-
mation of the Messenger,
" Where is my lady?"
Compare the following passages of Shakespeare ;
" Enter Hostess.
Host. O Jesu ! my lord, the prince, —
P. Hen. How now, my lady the hostess ! "
First Part of K. Henry IV. act ii. sc. 4, vol. iv. 270.
" Enter Groom.
Groom. Hail, royal prince !
K. Rich. Thanks, noble peer."
Richard II. act v. sc. 5, vol. iv. 211.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 522 ; K. p. 304.
" How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false
As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins
The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars," £c.
Here Mr. Collier has no comment ; nor, indeed, does the
passage require any.
5 MERCHANT OF VENICE.
Mr. Knight gives " stayers of sand," with the following
note ;
" This is ordinarily printed stairs of sand ; and no explanation is
given by the commentators. In the first folio the word is printed as
we print it — stayers. In the same edition we have, in ' As You Like
It,' ' In these degrees have they made a paire of staires to marriage.'
We have no great reliance upon the orthography of any of the old
editions ; but the distinction between stayers and staires is here re-
markable. Further, the propriety of the image appears to us to jus-
tify the restoration of the original word in this passage. Cowards in
their falseness — their assumption of appearances without realities —
may be compared to stairs of sand, which betray the feet of those
who trust to them ; but we have here cowards appearing ready to
face an enemy with
' The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars : '
they are false as stayers of sand — banks, bulwarks of sand, that the
least opposition will throw down — vain defences — feeble ramparts.
We derive the word stair from the Anglo-Saxon stigan, to ascend; —
stay — and thence stayer — from the Teutonic staen or stehen, to
stand."
" The distinction between stayers and staires remarkable !"
— I would request Mr. Knight's particular attention to the
subjoined passages, where the author has spelt the word in
THREE different ways ;
" hee going into the Chamber where they lay, tooke the yongest
of them named Elizabeth, forth of her bed, and carried her downe the
Stayres into his Celler hee carried the dead corps vp
three payre of stayres," &c. The Unnatur all Father, p. 137, — Taylor's
Workes, ed. 1630.
" A Seruingman and his mistris was landing at the Whitefryars
stayers ; the stayers being very bad, a waterman offered to helpe the
woman," &c. Wit and Mirth, p. 190, — ibid.
" the next day, when the water was ebd away, the Bitch went
downe the staires, and found her three drouned Puppies." A Dogge
of Warre, p. 231,— ibid.
The latter part of Mr. Knight's note — his defence and ex-
planation of "stayers" — is of more than Warburtonian subtlety,
and will assuredly never carry conviction to a single English-
man,— though, perhaps, it may receive the commendation of
MERCHANT OF VENICE. 57
Tieck, with his imperfect knowledge of the language, and in
gratitude for the respect with which Mr. Knight has treated
his vagaries (see my remarks on Macbeth, act ii. sc. 2).
SCENE 2.— C. p. 523.
" In measure rain thy joy ; scant this excess."
" It may reasonably be doubted whether we ought to read ' rain,'
or rein ; the old spelling, raine, is quite equivocal." COLLIER.
To doubt that " rain" is the right reading appears to me
most treasonable.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 534.
" I could not do withal."
" An idiom of the time for / could not help it. See Gifford's Ben
Jonson, iii. 470." COLLIER.
Though, after Gifford's decisive note, this phrase is not
likely to be again misinterpreted, I may cite the following
passage from Palsgrave's Lesclarcissement de la Lang. Fr. 1530 ;
" I can nat do withall, a thyng lyeth nat in me, or I am nat in
faulte that a thyng is done." Fol. clxxx. (Table of Verbes.)
ACT IV.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 539 ; K. p. 322.
" Some men there are love not a gaping pig ;
Some, that are mad if they behold a cat ;
And others, when the bag-pipe sings i' the nose,
Cannot contain their urine for affection :
Masters of passion sway it to the mood
Of what it likes, or loaths."
" This passage has occasioned a good deal of controversy, but the
difficulty seems to be to find a difficulty : in the old copies ' sway* is
printed sways, making a false concord, the nominative case being
' masters : ' the pronoun ' it/ of course, in both instances, agrees with
' passion.' Shylock, in the preceding lines, speaks of those who are
not ' masters of passion.' " COLLIER.
The preceding part of the passage clearly shews that there
58 MERCHANT OF VENICE.
must be a pause at " urine ;" as also that " for affection" must
be connected with the next line. Shylock states three circum-
stances ; first, that some men dislike a gaping pig ; secondly,
that some are mad if they see a cat ; thirdly, that some, at the
sound of the bag-pipe, cannot contain their urine : and he then
accounts for these three peculiarities on a general principle.
Waldron (Appendix to The Sad Shepherd, p. 213), observ-
ing that mistress was formerly written maistresse or maistres,
would read ;
" Cannot contain their urine : for affection,
Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood
Of what it likes, or loaths."
Mr. Knight (whose alteration is greatly preferable, because
it deviates from the old eds. only by omitting a single letter),
prints ;
" Cannot contain their urine : for affection,
Master of passion, sways it to the mood
Of what it likes, or loathes."
With respect to Mr. Collier's reading, I have further to
observe, that " Masters of passion" (if we understand the words
in the sense which, as his note shews, he supposes them to
bear) were the very persons of whom Shylock would carefully
avoid all mention.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 542; K. p. 325.
" O, be thou damn'd, inexorable dog," &c.
" Misprinted in the old copies, previous to the third folio of
1664, inexecrable." COLLIER.
Malone thought that " inexecrable" might be right (in
being an augmentative particle) ; Mr. Knight has adopted it ;
and Richardson has given the word a place in his Dictionary.
I agree with Mr. Collier in considering it a misprint.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 547.
" Shy. These be the Christian husbands ! I have a daughter ;
Would any of the stock of Barabbas
Had been her husband, rather than a Christian !
We trifle time ; I pray thee, pursue sentence."
MERCHANT OF VENICE. 59
Mr. Collier ought to have printed (with the other modern
editors) " Barrabas," as the metre here positively requires.
The word, I believe, was invariably made short in the second
syllable by the poetical writers of Shakespeare's days : in Mar-
lowe's Jew of Malta, " Barrabas" occurs seventy-eight times ;
compare, too, Taylor ;
" These are the brood of Barrabas, and these
Can rob, and be let loose againe at ease."
A Thiefe, p. 120,— Workes. ed. 1630.
and Fennor ;
" Thou Barrabas of all humanitie,
Base slanderer of Christianitie."
Defence, &c. p. 153, — ibid.
Moreover, the three first lines of this speech ought to be
marked as spoken " Aside."
ACT v.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 555.
" Sit, Jessica : look, how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patterns of bright gold ;
There's not the smallest orb, which thou behold'st," &c.
" This is the text of the second folio : the first folio has pattens,
as well as the 4to. by Heyes. The other 4to. has patients. ' Pat-
terns' seems the right reading." COLLIER.
By adopting the gross misprint " patterns," Mr. Collier has
done much to injure the picturesqueness of a passage which
an eminent writer has pronounced to be " the most sublime,
perhaps, in Shakespeare" (Hallam's Intr. to Lit. of Eur. iii.
147). What are "patterns of gold?" and how could the "floor
of heaven' be " INLAID" with "patterns?'1''
The not uncommon word patten, paten, patin, or patine,
means a plate. " The Patine of a chalice, Calici operculum,
patina." Coles's Diet.
60
AS YOU LIKE IT.
[Vol. iii. COLLIER ; vol. iii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 8.
" Many, sir, be better employed, and be naught awhile"
" A proverbial north-country expression, equivalent (says War-
burton) to « a mischief on you,' and Gifford agrees with him. See
Ben Jonson's Works, vol. iv. 421, and vol. vi. 160. Dr. Johnson
was of opinion, that ' be better employed, and be naught awhile,'
was to be taken in the same sense as saying, ' It is better to do
mischief than to do nothing.' "
Why should Dr. Johnson's utterly erroneous explanation
be dragged again into light ? Since the origin of verbal cri-
ticism, nothing more satisfactory has been written than the
copious note of Gifford (Jonson's Works, iv. 421), in which
he proves that " and be naught awhile " is a petty and fami-
liar malediction. Besides, the first part of Warbur ton's remark
is wrong ; the expression was certainly not confined to " the
north country."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 15 ; K. p. 273.
" CeL Pr'ythee, who is't that thou mean'st ?
Touch. One that old Frederick, your father, loves.
Ros. My father's love is enough to honour him enough," &c.
" As Malone remarks, there is some error here, as Frederick is
the father of Celia, and not of Rosalind. He suggests that we might
read Ferdinand for • Frederick.' Perhaps the name of the knight
was Frederick, and the clown's answer ought to run, ' One old Fre-
derick, that your father loves,' which only changes the place of
• that.' This is the more likely, because Frederick the usurper,
being younger than the exiled Duke, would hardly be called by the
clown ' Old Frederick.' " COLLIER.
The error lies in the prefix to the third speech, which is
rightly assigned to Celia by Theobald, Steevens, and Knight.
AS YOU LIKE IT. 61
As to " old," — Steevens justly observed that it is an unmean-
ing term of familiarity, without reference to age.
ACT III.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 56.
" I answer you right painted cloth."
" Orlando's reply has reference to the sentences often inscribed
upon tapestry, or ' painted cloth :' 'I answer you right painted
cloth ;' i. e. exactly in the style of the inscriptions upon tapestry."
COLLIER.
Again, in note, vol. vi. 136, Mr. Collier says, (f painted
cloth was tapestry," &c. But it was really cloth or canvass
painted in oil : see the long article in Nares's Gloss. Com-
pare too the following homely story related by the honest
Water-poet ;
" There's an old speech, a Tayler is a Thiefe,
And an old speech he hath for his reliefe,
I'll not equiuocate, I'll giue him 's due, —
He (truly) steales not, or he steales not, true.*
Those that report so, mighty wrong doe doe him,
For how can he steale that, that's brought vnto him ?
And it may be they were false idle speeches,
That one brought Cotton once, to line his Breeches,
And that the Tayler laid the Cotton by,
And with old painted Cloth the roome supply,
Which as the owner (for his vse) did weare,
A nayle or sceg by chance his breech did teare,
At which he saw the linings, and was wroth
For Diues and Lazarus on the painted Cloth,
The Gluttons dogs, and hels fire hotly burning,
With fiends and fleshhookes, whence ther's no returning.
He rip'd the other breech, and there he spide
The pamper'd Prodigall on cockhorse ride ;
There was his fare, his fidlers, and his whores,
His being poore, and beaten out of doores,
His keeping hogs, his eating huskes for meat,
His lamentation, and his home retreat,
* " He cannot steale truly, or truly he cannot steale."
62 AS YOU LIKE IT.
His welcome to his father, and the feast,
The fat calfe kill'd, all these things were exprest.
These transformations fild the man with feare,
That he hell-fire within his breech should beare ;
He mus'd what strange inchantments he had bin in,
That turn'd his linings into PAINTED LINNEN.
His feare was great, but at the last to rid it,
A Wizard told him, 'twas the Tayler did it."
A Thiefe, p. 119,— Taylor's Workes, ed. 1630.
For the sake of those who are curious in such matters, I
add a specimen of painted-cloth poetry, which has been pre-
served by the writer just quoted, who copied it from the walls
of a room at the Star in Rye in the year 1653 ;
" And as upon a bed I musing lay,
The chamber hang'd with painted cloth, I found
My selfe with sentences beleaguerd round :
There was Philosophy and History,
Poetry, ^Enigmatick mystery.
I know not what the Town in wealth may be,
But sure, I on that chambers walls did see
More wit then al the town had, and more worth
Then my unlearned Muse can well set forth.
I will not hold my Reader in dilemma,
This truly, lying, I transcribed them a.
No flower so fresh, but frost may it deface,
None sits so fast, but hee may lose his place.
Tis Concord keeps a Realme in stable stay,
But Discord brings all Kingdomes to decay.
No Subject ought (for any kinde of Cause)
Resist his Prince, but yeeld him to the Lowes.
Sure God is just, whose stroake delayed long,
Doth light at last with paine, more sharp and strong.
Time never was, nor n'ere I thinke shall be,
That Truth (unshent) might speake, in all things free.
This is the Sum, the Marrow and the Pith
My lying Chamber was adorned with :
And 'tis supposed, those lines written there
Have in that Roome bin more then 40 yeare."
The Certain Travailes of an uncertain Journey, &c.
1653, p. 19.
AS YOU LIKE IT. 63
ACT IV.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 72 ; K. p. 336.
" Jaq. Nay then, God be wi' you, an you talk in blank verse.
{Exit.
Ros. Farewell, monsieur traveller : look you lisp, and wear
strange suits ; disable all the benefits of your own country ; be out
of love with your nativity, and almost chide God for making you
that countenance you are, or I will scarce think you have swam in a
gondola. — Why, how now, Orlando ! " &c.
Does Rosalind say all this to Jaques after he has left the
stage ?
In the first folio the " exit" of Jaques is not marked at all.
In the three later folios it is placed (as by Mr. Collier and the
other modern editors) at the end of his speech. But exits
as well as entrances (see my remarks on Troilus and Cressida,
act i. sc. 2) were very frequently marked much earlier than
they were really intended to take place : and nothing can be
more evident than that here the " exit" of Jaques ought to
follow "gondola."
ACT v.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 982.
" And to the skirts of this wild wood he came,
Where, meeting with an old religious man,
After some question with him, was converted
Both from his enterprise, and from the world ;
His crown bequeathing to his banish' d brother,
And all their lands restor'd to him again,
That were with him exil'd."
" So the old copies, which modern editors have altered without
notice to ' restor'd to them again.' The meaning is, that the con-
verted brother restores to the banished brother his dukedom, and all
the lands of those who were in exile with him, in order that he (the
duke) may bestow the lands again on their former possessors. The
duke afterwards tells his nobles that he will give them back their
estates." COLLIER.
The other modern editors may, I think, be forgiven for
making without notice an alteration so obviously demanded by
64 AS YOU LIKE IT.
the context. The misprint of " him" for " 'em" or " them"
is one of the commonest ; and Mr. Collier himself elsewhere
gives ;
" Ay, sir ; I'll call them to you."
Merry Wives of Windsor, act iv. sc. 3, vol. i. 252.
(where the folio has " him")
" May have a tomb of orphans' tears wept on 'em."
King Henry VIII. act iii. sc. 2, vol. v. 571.
(where all the old eds. have " on Mm")
" Let them be made an overture for the wars."
Coriolanus, act i. sc. 9, vol. vi. 168.
(where all the old eds. have " Let him")
" Perchance, because she knows them innocent."
Titus Andron., act iii. sc. 1, vol. vi. 315.
(where all the old eds., except one, have " knows him")
" I see a cherub that sees them."
Hamlet, act iv. sc. 3, vol. vii. 299.
(where the folio has " him.")
When Mr. Collier remarked that " the duke afterwards
tells his nobles that he will give them back their estates," he
altogether mistook the meaning of the following lines, at
p. 99;
" And after, every of this happy number,
That have endur'd shrewd days and nights with us,
Shall share the good of our returned fortune,
According to the measure of their 'states [read states]."
i. e. all my faithful followers shall receive such reward as suits
their various stations.
65
TAMING OF THE SHREW.
[Vol. iii. COLLIER ; vol. ii. KNIGHT.]
INDUCTION. SCENE l._ C. p. 107 ; K. p. 124.
" Go by, S. Jeronimy :
Go to thy cold bed, and warm thee."
" In this passage, there is a double allusion to ' The Spanish
Tragedy' by Thomas Kyd. How the capital S became introduced
into the text, it is not easy to explain ; but Monck Mason would
make out that it is part of the word says, the rest having dropped
out ; but why should it have been printed with a capital letter ? The
phrase ' Go by* is derived from one part of ' The Spanish Tragedy/
of which Jeronimo may be called the hero ; and ' Go to thy cold bed,
and warm thee,' refers to another part of the same play, where Jero-
nimo exclaims, ' What outcries pluck me from my naked bed ? ' when
he enters in his night-dress, after the murder of his son. See ' Dods-
ley's Old Plays/ last edition, vol. iii. p. 130 & 163. Different parts
of this popular play were often quoted and ridiculed by contemporary
writers. Sly can scarcely mean to canonize Jeronimo, and call him
a saint, from his being such a favourite with the frequenters of our
early theatres ; and when Malone remarks, that ' Sly's making Jero-
nimy a saint is not more extravagant than his exhorting his hostess
to go to her cold bed and warm herself/ he was not aware of the
allusion to ' The Spanish Tragedy/ in the last line of Sly's reply "
COLLIER.
Mr. Collier's note is as little to the purpose as the notes
of the other commentators on this passage (which is certainly
not verse). The matter is clear enough. " S." is put for
" Saint" (a very common abbreviation) : Sly alludes to the
notorious and much-ridiculed lines of The Spanish Tragedy,
and at the same time confounds Jeronimo with Saint Jerome.
Mr. Knight prints; "Go — by S. Jeronimy — Go to thy
cold bed, and warm thee/' — evidently not aware that in more
than a dozen early dramas the words " Go by, Jeronimo"
(from Kyd's celebrated play), are cited and sneered at: for
instance ;
F
66 TAMING OF THE SHREW.
" Tuc. Goe by, leronimo, goe by ; and heere drop the ten shillings
into this Bason," £c. Dekker's Satiro-mastix, 1602, sig. D 2.
" But if I were as you, Ide cry, go by, leronimo, go by.'' Dek-
ker's Shoomakers Holy-Day, &c. sig. B 4, ed. 1624.
" Sim. Go from my window, go, go from, &c., away ; go by, old
Jeronimo: nay, and you shrink i' th' wetting, walk, walk, walk." Mid-
dleton's Blurt, Master Constable, — Works, i. 285, ed. Dyce.
" What new book have you there ? What ! Go by, Hieronymo ?"
Jonson's Every Man in his Humour, — Works, i. 34, ed. Gilford.
" for your brother,
I'll only say, Go by."
Massinger's Maid of Honour, — Works, iii. 91,
ed. 1813 (where see Gifford's note).
" she's like a play ; if new, very good company, very good com-
pany ; but if stale, like old Jeronimo, go by, go by." Webster and
Dekker's Westward Ho, — Webster's Works, iii. 45, ed. Dyce.
Indeed, the expression had become proverbial ;
" For as a cart-wheele in the way goes round,
The spoake that's high'st is quickly at the ground,
So Enuy, or iust cause, or misconceit,
In Princes Courts continually doe waite,
That he that is this day Magnifico,
To morrow may goe by Jeronimo."
Taylor's Superbia Flagellum, p. 35, — Workes, ed. 1630.
We even find it used as a nick-name ;
" And call thee Bloody-bones, and Spade, and Spit-fire,
And Gaffer Madman, and Go-by - Jeronimo,
And Will-with-a-whisp," &c.
Beaumont and Fletcher's Captain, act iii. sc. 5.
ACT i.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 132 ; K. p. 152.
" For she is sweeter than perfume itself,
To whom they go. What will you read to her ?"
" The folios read, ' To whom they go to ;' redundant by the sense
and metre." COLLIER.
TAMING OF THE SHREW. 67
In a note on the following passage of Massinger's Very
Woman, act iii. sc. 5,
" Heaven knows to what 'twill mount to,"
Gifford, after giving an example of similar phraseology in
Beaumont and Fletcher, which the editors of those poets had
thought fit to alter, adds ;
" When it is considered that the repetition so sedulously removed,
was as anxiously sought after by our old writers, and was, indeed,
characteristic of their style and manner, we may, perhaps, be indulged
in forming a wish that those who undertake to revive and explain
them, were somewhat more competent to the office." Works, iv.
301, ed. 1813.
Mr. Knight, as well as Mr. Collier, improperly throws out
from the text the second "to" in the present passage; yet
they both print ;
" Presents more woful pageants, than the scene
Wherein we play in" 7.7 ..
As you like it, act 11. sc. 7.
" In what enormity is Marcius poor in, that you two have not in
abundance?" Coriolanus, act ii. sc. 1.
" And what not done, that thou hast cause to rue,
Wherein I had no stroke of mischief in it ?"
Titus Andron., act v. sc. 1.
" That fair, for which love groan'd/or, and would die."
Romeo and Juliet, act i. sc. 5.
The same repetition is found in writers long posterior to
Shakespeare ; e. g.
" Lady Bashfull. O in what a torment I have been in ! hell is not
like it." Loves Adventures, act i. sc. 4, — Playes by the Duchess of
Newcastle, 1662.
With respect to the " metre " of the present passage, — why
should Mr. Collier object to a line of eleven syllables, when a
little after, in the same page, he gives one which consists of no
fewer than fifteen? —
" Trow you, whither I am going ? — To Baptista Minola."
68 TAMING OF THE SHREW.
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 137.
" but for these other goods,
Unbind my hands, I'll put them off myself,
Yea, all my raiment, to my petticoat."
" Theobald read gawds, and all the modern editors have followed
him, but without any necessity for the change from the old reading."
COLLIER.
" Goods" appears to me to be all but nonsense.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 148.
" 'tis a world to see,
How tame, when men and women are alone,
A meacock wretch can make the curstest shrew."
" The meaning seems to be, ' it is worth a world to see.' So in
Rydley's ' Brief Declaration of the Lord's Supper/ 1555 (as Mr.
Bruce pointed out to me), 'It is a world to see the answer of the
Papists to this place of Origen.' " COLLIER.
If (as the above note seems to shew) Mr. Bruce and Mr.
Collier suppose that the expression in question is of unfre-
quent occurrence, they are greatly mistaken. It is, indeed, an
extremely common one in writers of all descriptions, both in
those long anterior and those long posterior to the time of
Shakespeare : it occurs, for instance, in Skelton's Bowge of
Courte (composed perhaps before 1500), Works, i. 47^ ed.
Dyce ; and is found even in the Second Volume of Strype's
Annals of the Reform.) which was first published in 1725, and
must have been written only a few years earlier ; " But it was
a World to consider, what unjust Oppressions of the People,
and the Poor, this occasioned, by some griping Men, that
were concerned therein." p. 209.
ACT IV.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 178.
" You bid be make it orderly and well,
According to the fashion, and the time."
Read, with all other eds., early and modern, " me.'
69
ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.
[Vol. iii. COLLIER ; vol. i. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 221 ; K. p. 355.
" An we might have a good woman born but ere every blazing
star, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lottery well : a man may
draw his heart out, ere he pluck one."
" Steevens left out ere, (printed ore in the old copies,) not being
able to make anything of it; and M alone suggested that it was put
for or, i. e. before : the fact seems to be, that o was merely substituted
for e, by an error of the press : ' ere every blazing star ' is prior to the
appearance of every blazing star. It is surprising that ' ere,' which
occurs again just below, did not explain the mystery to Malone."
COLLIER.
The reading of Mr. Collier is no better than that of Ma-
lone : both (vulgarly speaking) put the cart before the horse.
Blazing stars are mentioned by our old writers as portending
prodigies, — not as coming after them. Mr. Knight has, I
have no doubt, given the right reading, viz. " for." In the
quartos of Hamlet (act v. sc. 2) there is a similar misprint:
they have " or my complexion," where the folio rightly reads
"for my complexion."
SCENE 3. — C. p. 222 ; K. p. 355.
" Diana, no queen of virgins, that would suffer her poor knight
to be surprised, without rescue, in the first assault, or ransom after-
ward."
" Theobald supplied the words ' Diana, no,' which are omitted in
the old copies : he also added 'to be' in the next line, and those
words seem equally necessary." COLLIER.
The addition of " to be " is unnecessary, as might be shewn
by various passages of our early writers, besides the follow-
ing one ;
70 ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.
" And suffer not their mouthes shut vp, oh Lord,
Which stil thy name with praises doo record !"
Drayton's Harmonic of the Church, 1591, sig. F 2.
ACT II.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 244 ; K. p. 378.
" Good fortune, and the favour of the king,
Smile upon this contract ; whose ceremony
Shall seem expedient on the now borne brief,
And be perform'd to-night : the solemn feast
Shall more attend upon the coming space,
Expecting absent friends."
" The clear meaning is obscurely expressed : if we take now (to
which Shakespeare prefixes the definite article) to be used substan-
tively, and if we derive borne from the verb to bear, the king says
that the marriage shall not be deferred, ' whose ceremony shall seem
expedient on the now, (or on the instant,) to be borne briefly/ or con-
cluded without delay." COLLIER.
Of all the attempts to explain this difficult passage, Mr.
Collier's is the most extraordinary. "Brief" is evidently a
substantive ; and the probability seems to be that Steevens
was right in considering " the now-born brief" (which is mani-
festly the true reading, and given by Messrs. Malone and
Knight) as equivalent to " the contract recently and suddenly
made."
ACT III.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 264 ; K. p. 398.
" Wid. I hope so. — Look, here comes a pilgrim : I know she
will lie at my house ; thither they send one another.
I'll question her. — God save you, pilgrim !
Whither are you bound ?"
Nothing can well be more awkward than this separation
of " I'll question her" from what precedes. The speech
ought either (as Malone gives it) to conclude with a line of
blank verse, thus, —
" God save you, pilgrim ! whither are you bound?"
or (as Mr. Knight prints it) to stand wholly prose.
ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. 71
In the next page of Mr. Collier's edition the first speech
of the Widow is most unhappily arranged, — with three im-
perfect lines together.
SCENE 5. — C. p. 266; K. p. 399.
" Dia. Alas, poor lady !
'Tis a hard bondage, to become the wife
Of a detesting lord.
Wid. I write good creature : wheresoe'er she is,
Her heart weighs sadly."
" The first folio has ' I write good creature/ which Malone re-
tains, in the sense of ' I consider her a good creature.' The fact is
that such was the phraseology of Shakespeare's time, and in this
very play (see p. 245) Lafeu tells Parolles, ' I write man, to which
title age cannot bring thee.' Malone omits this apposite instance,
but quotes, ' About it, and write happy when thou hast done/ from
' King Lear/ A. v. sc. 3, and ' Since I writ widow/ from Lodowick
Barry's comedy of 'Ram Alley/ 1611. It is curious to note how
soon this mode of expression had gone out of use, for in the second
folio the passage in the text is altered to ' I (*. e. ay} right, good
creature/ " COLLIER.
If Mr. Collier had wished to prove beyond all possibility
of dispute that the reading which he gives is the wrong one,
he could not have done so more effectually than by citing
these three passages in its defence. The first passage, " J
write man," means, — I write myself man ; the second, " Write
happy, when thou hast done," — Write thyself happy, when
thou hast done ; the third, " Since / writ widow," — Since /
writ myself, widow — (so too in The Second Part of King
Henry IV., act i. sc. 2, " As if he had writ man ever since his
father was a bachelor," i. e. writ himself man ; in Belchier's
Hans Beer-pot^ His Invisible Comedie, &c. 1618, sig. G 4, " His
father neare gaue armes, writ good-man Clunch" i. e. writ him-
self good-man Clunch ; in Beaumont and Fletcher's Wit at
several weapons^ act i. sc. 1, " When I scarce writ man" i. e.
writ myself man. ; in Fletcher's Queen of Corinth, act v. sc. 1,
" in every family
That does write lustful, your fine bawd gains more
7j> ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.
(For, like your broker, he takes fees on both sides)
Than all the officers of the house,"
i. e. write itself lustful ; in Massinger's Duke of Milan, act v.
sc. 2;
" These hands too, that disdain'd to take a touch
From any lip, whose owner writ not lord,"
i. e. writ not himself lord ; and in the Epistle Dedicatory to
Hookes's Amanda,* 1653, " You might better have writ man
at fifteen," &c., i. e. writ yourself man): — THEREFORE the
words, " I write good creature," can only signify, — I write my-
self good creature.
Mr. Knight very properly reads ;
" Wid. Ay, right-, good creature, wheresoe'er she is,
Her heart weighs sadly."
" Ay," as Mr. Collier elsewhere remarks, " was almost invari-
ably spelt with a capital 7" (vol. iv. 176) ; and the lection of
the first folio, " write," is evidently one of those not unfre-
quent misprints, which were occasioned by the compositor's
having followed his copy only so far as to give the sound of the
word, not its proper spelling, — or, as Mr. Collier terms it,
"printed by his ear" (vol. iv.
ACT IV.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 281 ; K. p. 413.
" Since Frenchmen are so braid,
Marry that will, I live and die a maid."
" The explanation of this word given by Steevens seems the right
one, though it has been disputed : ' Braid signifies crafty, deceitful /
* I may just notice, that a line in a copy of commendatory verses by " Tho.
Adams," prefixed to this worthless volume, —
" that all
May her Amanda, you Amandus call,"
seems to have been floating in the mind of Sterne, when he told the story of " two
fond lovers, separated from each other by cruel parents, and by still more cruel
destiny —
Amandus He
Amanda She —
each ignorant of the other's course," &c.— Tristram Shandy, vol. vii. ch. xxxi.
p. 113, ed. 1765.
ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. 73
and he derives it from the Anglo-Saxon bred, which is usually trans-
lated fraus. The ordinary sense is that which Palsgrave gives in his
Dictionary, 1530, 'hastynesse of mynde.' For this reference I have
to thank the Rev. A. Dyce, and it accords with the sense given in
Sir F. Madden's Glossary to ' Syr Gawayne.' ' At a braid,' or on a
sudden, is a not unusual expression ; the meaning of Diana might,
therefore, possibly be, that Frenchmen are so hasty and sudden ; but
this is hardly consistent with what she has previously said of them."
COLLIER.
" Braid — crafty, according to Steevens. Home Tooke has a curious
notion that the word here means brayed — as a fool is said to be in a
mortar. Mr. Richardson, in his Dictionary, considers that in this
passage it bears the sense of violent." KNIGHT.
The remark of Richardson (imperfectly quoted by Mr.
Knight) is — " The word appears to refer to the suddenness and
violence with which Bertram had wooed her : " and, no doubt,
there is suddenness and violence implied by the word, but not,
I apprehend, in the sense which Richardson supposes. Braid
seems to be equivalent here to 'violent in desire, lustful;*
Diana alluding to that licentiousness in Bertram, with which
his countrymen have been often charged ;
" Cholmeley. If 'a take my wife, 'a shall finde her meate.
Surrey. And reason good, Sir Roger Cholmeley, too.
If these hott Frenchemen needsly will haue sporte,
They should in kindnesse yet deffraye the charge."
Sir Thomas More, a play,— MS. Harl. 7368, fol. 5.
ACT V.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 304 ; K. p. 433.
" Which better than the first, O, dear heaven, bless !
Or, ere they meet, in me, O nature, cease /"
Mr. Collier ought to have retained (with Mr. Knight) the
reading of the first folio, " cesse," on account of the rhyme.
74
TWELFTH-NIGHT.
[Vol. iii. COLLIER ; vol. iii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 5 — C. p. 340.
" I protest, I take these wise men, that crow so at these set kind
of fools, no better than tine fools' zanies.''
" Douce says, that 'fools' zanies' in the text means 'fools' bau-
bles,' which had upon the top of them the head of a fool." COLLIER.
Douce's explanation is strangely wrong. " The fools'
zanies" is equivalent to ' the buffoons, or mimics, of the fools.'
Zany, both as a substantive and verb, is commonly used in
that sense by our early writers ;
" Most worthy man, with thee it is euen thus,
As men take Dottrels, so hast thou ta'n vs ;
Which, as a man his arme or leg doth set,
So this fond Bird will likewise counterfeit :
Thou art the Fowler, and doest shew vs shapes,
And we are all thy Zanies, thy true Apes."
Verses on Coryate by Drayton, in the Odcombian
Banquet, &c., 1611, sig. N.
" Laughes them to scorne, as man doth busie apes
When they will zanie men."
Marston's Antonios Reuenge, 1602, sig. G 2.
ACT II.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 352.
" a stoop of wine !"
" The word ' stoop,' says Reed, is derived from the Belgic, and is
equivalent to a measure of two quarts." COLLIER.
" Stoop" which means here ' cup,' is a word applied to
vessels of various kinds and sizes. Could Reed or Mr. Collier
suppose that when Sir Toby calls out in his niece's house for
" a stoop of wine," he expects two quarts to be brought to him?
TWELFTH-NIGHT. 75
or that the " stoops of wine," which the King in Hamlet (act v.
sc. 2) orders to be set upon the table, contain that measure
exactly ?
SCENE 2.— C. p. 353.
" I sent thee sixpence for thy lemon : hadst it ?"
" The word is spelt " lemon" in the old copies, and the meaning
may only be, that Sir Andrew sent the Clown sixpence in return for,
or to buy a lemon. On the other hand, Sir Andrew may have sent
the sixpence to the Clown's mistress or sweet-heart," &c. COLLIER.
" Lemon" ! ! The obvious correction " leman," i. e. sweet-
heart, was first made by Theobald : nor did any of his succes-
sors, except Mr. Collier, ever dream of retaining the error of
the old eds.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 358.
" if I do not gull him into a nay word, and make him a common
recreation, do not think I have wit enougfi io lie straight in my bed."
" t. e. a byeword, says Steevens. Lexicographers quote no other
instances of its use, but from Shakespeare. In the old copies it
is printed ' an ay word,' and perhaps that is the true reading, the
meaning being ' an everlasting word :' ' ay' is ever. In ' The Merry
Wives of Windsor,' however, it stands 'nayword' in the folios."
COLLIER.
The explanation of Steevens is right. Forby, in his Vo-
cabulary of East Anglia gives " Nay-word .... A bye-word ;
a laughing-stock."
ACT III.
SCENE ].— C. p. 374; K. p. 197.
" Cressida was a beggar."
" Malone appositely quotes the following passage, from Chaucer's
' Testament of Creseyde/ " &c. COLLIER.
" In Chaucer's ' Testament of Cresseyde,' " &c. KNIGHT.
The poem in question was written, not by Chaucer, but
by Robert Henryson.
76 TWELFTH-NIGHT.
" I will construe to them whence you come."
Here Mr. Knight properly retains the reading of the old
eds., " conster," a form which is repeatedly found in our
early writers ;
" We must not conster hereof as you mean."
Peek's Arr. of Paris,— Works, i. 24, ed. 1829.
" Nor his subtill nature conster,
Borne a man, but dyes a monster."
Marston's Insatiate Countesse, sig. K. ed. 1613.
" And that which you were apt to conster
A simple innocence in me," &c.
Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster, act ii. sc. 1.
" Conster me that."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady,
act iii. sc. 1.
" Men are so captious the'ile euer conster ill."
Hey wood's Fay re Maide of the Exchange,
sig. B4, ed. 1625.
" Doe I want money ? let me conster this."
Marmyon's Fine Companion, 1633, sig. D 4.
See too Butler's Hudibras, p. i. c. iii. 1214. Even Pope
writes, " Lord William will conster this La tine, if you send it
to Thistleworth." Letter to the Duchess of Hamilton, — Add.
to Works, 1776, vol. ii. 2.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 392 ; K. p. 211.
" He is knight, dubbed with unhatch'd rapier, and on carpet
consideration."
" An ' unhatched rapier' is an unhacked rapier, from the Fr.
hacher" COLLIER.
" The knights of peace," says Mr. Knight (' Illustrations of act iii.'
p. 218,) mayors, and justices, and serjeants-at-law, and physicians —
grave men who hate a hatched rapier, which has seen service, as
bitterly as King James, are called carpet knights, according to Randle
Holme, &c."
In Shirley's Love in a Maze, act ii. sc. 2, we find ;
" Thy hair is fine as gold, thy chin is hatch'd
With silver," &c.
TWELFTH-NIGHT. 77
" f. e.," says Gifford, " ornamented with a white or silvery beard.
This .... explains the passage in Troilus and Cressida [act i.
sc. 3] , 'As venerable Nestor hatch' d in silver,' on which the com-
mentators have wasted so many words. Literally, to hatch is to inlay
[originally, I believe, to cut, engrave, mark with lines] ; metaphori-
cally, it is to adorn, to beautify, with silver, gold, &c.," [also to
colour or stain]. Shirley's Works, ii. 301.
That the word hatch was particularly applied to the orna-
menting of weapons, might be shewn from many examples
besides the following ;
" Who first shall wound through others armes, his blood appear-
ing fresh,
Shall win this sword, siluerd, and hatcht."
Chapman's Iliads of Homer, b. xxiii. p. 324.
[rode fyaayavov apyvporjXov,
KaXov. v. 807.]
" Dote on my horse well trapp'd, my sword well hatch'd."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Bonduca, act ii. sc. 2.
" Hatching, is to silver or gild the hilt and pomell of a sword or
hanger :" R. Holme's Ac. of Armory, 1688, b. iii. p. 91. " Hatched
(as a sword-hilt), reticulatus." Coles's Diet. See too Cotgrave's
Diet, in v. hacher.
Now, since hatch was a very common technical term for
the ornamenting of weapons, is there any probability that
Shakespeare would have employed the expression " unhatched
rapier" in the sense of ( unhacked rapier?' Surely not. An
" unhatched rapier" could only mean ' an unornamented
rapier ;' which does not suit the context, for carpet-knights
were most likely to have the ceremony performed with a
highly-ornamented sword.
But, it may be asked, is "unhatched rapier" equivalent to
' a rapier unstained with blood ? ' The following passages of
Beaumont and Fletcher, among many others which might be
adduced, will shew distinctly that such an elliptical expression
could never have been employed ;
" Come, sons of honour,
True virtue's heirs, thus hatch'd with Britain-blood," &c.
Bonduca, act iii. sc. 5.
78 TWELFTH-NIGHT.
" His weapon hatch' d in blood."
The Humorous Lieutenant, act i. sc. 1 .
" When thine own bloody sword cried out against thee,
Hatched in the life of him"
The Custom of the Country, act v. sc. 5.
I am therefore strongly inclined to agree with those com-
mentators who have supposed that the right reading in the
present passage of Shakespeare is " unhacked rapier."
ACT IV.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 403.
" They have here propertied me."
" ' They have taken possession of me, as of a man unable to look
to himself. This is Johnson's explanation ; but it may be doubted,
whether Shakespeare had not some allusion to the * properties ' (as
they were then, and are still called) of a theatre, which when out of use
were thrust into some dark loft or lumber-room." COLLIER.
There is certainly no allusion here to theatrical " proper-
ties"— no more than there is in the following passages of
Shakespeare ;
" Your grace shall pardon me ; I will not back :
I am too high-born to be propertied,
To be a secondary at control,
Or useful serving-man, and instrument,
To any sovereign state throughout the world."
King John, act v. sc. 2.
" his large fortune,
Upon his good and gracious nature hanging,
Subdues and properties to his love and tendance
All sorts of hearts."
Timon of Athens, act i. sc. 1 .
79
THE WINTER'S TALE.
[Vol. iii. COLLIER ; vol. iv. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 437.
" Most dear'st ! my collop ! — Can thy dam ? — may't be
Affection ? thy intention stabs the centre :
Thou dost make possible things not so held,
Communicat'st with dreams ; — (how can this be ?)—
With what's unreal thou coactive art,
And fellow'st nothing. Then, 'tis very credent,
Thou may'st co-join with something ; and thou dost ;
(And that beyond commission ;) and I find it,
And that to the infection of my brains,
And hardening of my brows."
" Most of the editors, from Rowe downwards, have agreed to un-
derstand ' affection' as imagination ; but the meaning is clear without
any such forced construction. Leontes is looking towards Hermione
and Polixenes when he asks, ' Can thy dam? — may't be affection ?'
i. e. is it possible she feels love for him ? and then he goes on to
observe that her intention stabs him to the centre, and makes possible
things considered impossible. Shakespeare, over and over again,
uses ' affection' for love, and ' intention' here is to be taken rather as
intentness, vehemence, or ardour of mind. In the old copies the punc-
tuation is such as we have adopted, and although, as we have said
before, that can and ought to be no rule, in cases of difficulty it may
be some guide." COLLIER.
If Mr. Collier had carried on his paraphrase of this speech
beyond the first three lines, the prodigious absurdity of the pre-
sent punctuation and explanation must surely have become so
evident to himself, that he would have at once discarded them.
The question, " May't be affection ? " is odd and feeble enough :
but how could Hermione be said to " communicate with
dreams" to be " coactive with what's unreal," &c. ? As to the
pointing of the old copies here, on which Mr. Collier lays some
stress, — the fact is, the punctuation of the first folio at the
80 THE WINTER'S TALE.
commencement of the passage is only a little less ridiculous
than its punctuation of the fifth line, —
" With what's vnreall : thou coactive art,
And fellow'st nothing."
I cannot doubt that the next editor of Shakespeare will
give the passage as it used to stand till it underwent this most
unfortunate " restoration." Leontes, after saying,
" Can thy dam ? may't be ?" —
(so again, three lines after, "how can this be?") breaks off
in an apostrophe to " affection," which is continued to the end
of the speech, —
" Affection, thy intention stabs the centre," &c.
(Affection meaning ' imagination/ or ' the disposition of the
mind when strongly affected or possessed by a particular idea :'
see Malone's note ad I.)
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 456.
" 1 Lord. For her, my lord,
I dare my life lay down, and will do't, sir,
Please you t'accept it, that the queen is spotless
I' the eyes of heaven, and to you : I mean,
In this which you accuse her.
Ant. If it prove
She's otherwise, /'// keep my stables where
I lodge my wife ; Til go in couples with her" &c.
" The meaning is not very clear, unless we take ' stable ' in its
etymological sense from stabulum, a standing-place, abode, or habi-
tation. In that case, Antigonus only says that he will take care never
to allow his wife to dwell in any place where he is not. The Rev.
Mr. Barry recommends this interpretation to me ; but it so, we ought
to read * stables' in the singular." COLLIER.
A more wretched " interpretation" than Mr. Barry's could
hardly be imagined. Perhaps Antigonus means, — If Hermione
prove unchaste, I shall then have no doubt that my wife is in-
clined to play the wanton, and therefore I will allow her no
THE WINTER'S TALE. 81
more liberty than I allow my horses (" I'll keep my stables
where I lodge my wife"), or my hounds (" I'll go in couples
with her").
SCENE 1.— C. p. 456 ; K. p. 40.
" You are abus'd, and by some putter- on,
That will be damn'd for't ; would I knew the villain,
I would land- damn him."
" This word seems inexplicable ; and all the learned ink the
commentators have spent upon it has been merely wasted. Dr.
Farmer's suggestion of laudanum him comes nearest to the sound,
perhaps, but seems quite as far from the sense as any of the other
conjectures. The word 'lamback' occurs in various writers, and
means to beat-, but it can hardly have been mistaken by the printer,
and it would not be forcible enough for Antigonus' state of mind."
COLLIER.
" We are unable to explain this ; and it is scarcely necessary to
trouble our readers with the notes of the commentators, some of
which [Mr. K. alludes to Hanmer's note] are not of the most delicate
nature. Farmer's conjecture, that it meant laudanum him — poison
him with laudanum — is, we suppose, intended for a joke." KNIGHT.
What can Mr. Collier mean by " laudanum him coming
nearest to the sound ? " Those critics who have been the most
successful in conjectural emendation were never guided by
similarity of sound, but solely by the ductus literarum. Far-
mer's conjecture is undoubtedly (excepting Mr. Collier's) the
worst which has been offered on the passage. That of Sir
Thomas Hanmer is at least in keeping with the grossness of
the lines which follow.
In the word " land-damn" there appears to be an incurable
corruption ; but I may just notice that a similar compound
(not acknowledged by our dictionaries) occurs in the once-
popular poem of Warner ;
" Hence countrie Loutes land-lurch their Lords."
Albions England, p. 219, ed. 1596.
8% THE WINTER'S TALE.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 471.
" Offi. It is his highness* pleasure, that the queen
Appear in person here in court. [Silence"
" The word ' Silence* is printed as a stage- direction in the first
folio, without any indication of the entrance of the queen, &c. This
deficiency the second folio supplied merely by the word • Enter,'
which follows ' Silence.' The third and fourth folios adopt the read-
ing of the second. Malone and all the other modern editors have
chosen to take ' Silence' as an exclamation of the officer : so it might
be; but the printer of the folio, 1623, did not so understand it, and
the editor of the folio, 1632, when correcting an obvious omission,
did not think fit to alter the reading. The word Silence was probably
meant to mark the suspense, that ought to be displayed by all upon
the stage, on the entrance of Hermione to take her trial." COLLIER.
In a note on the Third Part of King Henry VI. act iv.
sc. 3 (vol. v. 303), Mr. Collier observes that to the stage-direc-
tion, " Enter WARWICK, CLARENCE, OXFORD, SOMERSET, and
Forces" the old eds. add " Silent all, in the same way tbat in
' The Winter's Tale,' Silence is given as a stage-direction," &c.
But " silent all" forming part of a stage-direction (and mean-
ing, that the persons in question, who were about to surprise
King Edward in his tent, should steal upon the stage with
as little noise as possible), is a very different matter from
" Silence" standing alone as an admonition to the players.
That here tbe word belongs either to the Officer, or to a
Crier, is proved by the following passage of Shakespeare's
Henry Fill., at the opening of the trial of Queen Katherine ;
" Wol. Whilst our commission from Rome is read,
Let silence be commanded.
K. Hen. What's the need ?
It hath already publicly been read,
And on all sides th' authority allow'd ;
You may, then, spare that time.
Wol. Be't so. — Proceed.
Scribe. Say, Henry king of England, come into the court.
Crier. Henry king of England," &c.
Act ii. sc. 4, vol. v. 543.
THE WINTER S TALE.
If the " commission from Rome" had been read in court, the
Crier would have previously proclaimed " Silence ! "
ACT IV.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 495 ; K. p. 73.
" streak'd gillyflowers."
" Pronounced ofoldgillyvors, and so spelt in the folios, both here,
when the word is spoken by Perdita, and afterwards by Polixenes."
COLLIER.
" Gillyvor" (written also gillofer, gillofre, gelofer) cannot
properly be termed an old spelling : it is an old form of the
word ; for which Mr. Collier and other modern editors ought
not to have substituted "gillyflower" In Perdita's speech
the folios have " gilly-vors," in that of Polixenes " gilly'vors "
(which Mr. Knight gives in both speeches) : but the word
should be written neither with a hyphen nor as a contraction.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 498 ; K. p. 75.
" I think, you have
As little skill to fear, as I have purpose
To put you to't."
Warburton was surely right in explaining " skill" ( reason.'
The word with that meaning is very common in our earliest
writers, and is occasionally found in those of Shakespeare's
time;
" Hence Englands Heires apparant haue of Wales bin Princes, till
Our Queene deceast conceald her Heire, I wot not for what skill."
Warner's Continuance of Albions England, 1606, p. 415.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 500.
" inkles, caddisses, cambrics, lawns."
" Malone states that inkle is ' a kind of tape/ and caddis ' a nar-
row worsted galloon/ but without citing any authority. It may be
suspected that ' caddis' was some ornament brought from Cadiz, with
other fashions, by the Earl of Essex," &c. COLLIER.
84 THE WINTER'S TALE.
Why these random conjectures ? Malone was quite right
about the meaning of this not very uncommon word. " Cruel,
caddas, or worsted ribbon." The Rates of the Custome house
&c. 1582, sig. B v. " Caddas or Cruell riband." The Rates
of Marchandizes, &c. n. d. sig. C 5.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 514 ; K. p. 89.
" how shall we do ?
We are not furnish'd like Bohemia's son,
Nor shall appear in Sicilia "
Here all the modern editors (in opposition to the old
copies) put a break at the end of the speech, as if it were
unfinished. But the sense is complete ;
" Nor shall appear [like Bohemia's son] hi Sicilia."
ACT V.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 540; K. p. 119.
" Paul. It is requir'd,
You do awake your faith. Then, all stand still.
On, those that think it is unlawful business
I am about ; let them depart."
" The meaning is, ' Let those go on, and depart, who think it is
unlawful business I am about.' Sir T. Hanmer, without necessity,
altered ' on/ the reading of the old copy, to or, and he has been
usually followed. ' On' could hardly have been misprinted for or,
because iu all the old copies it is followed by a colon." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight prints ;
" On: Those that think it is unlawful business
I am about, let them depart," —
and explains " On" — " let us go on."
Which of these two interpretations is the most forced and
ridiculous, it would be difficult to decide. Sir T. Hanmer's
alteration of " On" to " Or" is obviously necessary: in an
earlier scene of the present play, where the right reading is
undoubtedly " or," the first folio has " at ;" see Mr. Collier's
THE WINTER'S TALE. 85
note ad loc. p. 519 ; and in Shakespeare's LVIth Sonnet,
where the old copy has "As call it," &c., Mr. Collier has rightly
given " Or call it," &c. As to his remark that "'On' could
hardly have been misprinted for Or, because in all the old
copies it is followed by a colon," — I have already cited from
the first folio a line of this play, in the middle of which a colon
occurs, while the sense positively requires that there should be
no point at all; see p. 80 : nor would it be difficult to bring
forward from various old books a host of passages in which
stops are introduced with the grossest impropriety : e. g.
" And wish, she were so now, as when my lust
Forc'd you; to quite the Countrey."
The Custom of the Country, act v. sc. 5, p. 22, —
Beaumont and Fletcher's Workes, ed. 1647.
" Let's burn this Noble body : Sweetes as many
As sun-burnt : Neroe [Meroe~] breeds, He make a flame of
Shall reach his soule in heaven."
Valentinian, act iv. sc. 4, p. 22, — ibid.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 541.
" Nay, present your hand :
When she was young you woo'd her ; now, in age,
Is she become the suitor ?"
The old copies, indeed, have an interrogation-point here ;
but assuredly no question is asked : Paulina means, ' you for-
merly wooed her, and now she wooes you.' The original com-
positor put an interrogation-point, because " Is she " sounded
like a question.
A passage of Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest Man's For-
tune, act i. sc. 1, stands as follows in the folio, 1647 ;
" and began to laugh
Your adversaries Advocate to scorn :
Who like a cunning foot -man ? set me forth
With such a temperate easie kind of course
To put him into exercise of strength,
And follow'd his advantages so close,
That when," &c. p. 151.
86 THE WINTER'S TALE.
The proper punctuation is, of course,
" Who, like a cunning footman, set me forth," &c.
but the words sounded to the compositor like a question.
Even Mr. Collier's Shakespeare furnishes an example of
the same mistake : in King Richard III. act iv. sc. 4, vol. v.
461, we find,
" Look, what is done cannot be now amended?"
the compositor having put an interrogation-point at the end of
the line because " what is done " sounded like a question.
87
KING JOHN.
[Vol. iv. COLLIER ; vol. iv. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE l.—C. p. 10; K. p. 251.
" Bast. Because he hath a half-face, like my father,
With half that face would he have all my land :
A half-fac'd groat five hundred pound a year I"
" This is the reading of all the folios ; and the meaning is, that
because Robert had only a thin narrow face, like his father, yet with
only half the face of his father, he would have all his father's land.
Since the time of Theobald, all editors have printed the second line,
' With that half-face/ &c., which does not express what the poet
seems to have intended. Philip ridicules Robert for having, in fact,
only half of the half-face of his father, yet claiming all the inheritance
by reason of it." COLLIER.
The "half that" of the old eds. is merely a transposition
made by a mistake of the original compositor. Mr. Knight
observes that Theobald's alteration " appears just :" he might
have said, — that the context proves it to be absolutely indis-
pensable. According to the old reading (in spite of Mr. Col-
lier's strange explanation), the second line contradicts the first.
It may perhaps be worth remarking here that the follow-
ing line of Romeo and Juliet (act ii. sc. 6, vol. vi. 430),
" I cannot sum up half my sum of wealth,"
is given in the old eds. thus (the words " half my" being
shuffled out of their right place) ;
" I cannot sum up sum of half my wealth,"
and
" I cannot sum up some of half my wealth."
ACT II.
SCENE l.—C. p. 25 ; K. p. 272.
" K. John. For our advantage ; therefore, hear us first. —
These flags of France, that are advanced here
88 KING JOHN.
Before the eye and prospect of your town,
Have hither march'd to your endamagement :
The cannons have their bowels full of wrath,
And ready mounted are they, to spit forth
Their iron indignation 'gainst your walls :
All preparation for a bloody siege,
And merciless proceeding by these French,
Comfort your city's eyes, your winking gates ;
And, but for our approach, those sleeping stones,
That as a waist do girdle you about,
By the compulsion of their ordnance
By this time from their fixed beds of lime
Had been dishabited, and wide havoc made
For bloody power to rush upon your peace.
But, on the sight of us, your lawful king,
Who painfully, with much expedient march,
Have brought a countercheck before your gates,
To save unscratch'd your city's threaten'd cheeks,
Behold, the French amaz'd vouchsafe a parle ;
And now, instead of bullets wrapp'd in fire,
To make a shaking fever in your walls,
They shoot but calm words, folded up in smoke,
To make a faithless error in your ears :
Which trust accordingly, kind citizens,
And let us in, your king ; whose laboured spirits,
Forewearied in this action of swift speed,
Crave harbourage within your city walls."
" So all the old copies : King John is evidently speaking ironi-
cally. Rowe altered ' comfort' to confront, and such has since been
the received reading." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight was the first who suggested that " Comfort
might be used by John in irony" (though he printed " Con-
front" in his own text); and if this suggestion had been
thrown out by Steevens, I should have supposed that it had
originated in the hope of inducing the next editor to adopt a
reading, which " the malicious George " would afterwards have
had great satisfaction in pronouncing to be an absurdity.
I have extracted the whole speech ; and I appeal to the
plain sense of the most uncritical reader, if he can discover in
it even a shadow of irony; — a rhetorical figure, indeed, which
. KING JOHN. 89
would naturally be avoided by King John, whose object in the
present address is to gain over the citizens of Angiers.
In the next scene we find ;
" Strength match'd with strength, and power confronted power."
p. 29.
in Hamlet;
" Whereto serves mercy,
But to confront the visage of offence ?"
Act iii. sc. 3.
in The Winter's Tale;
" Unless another,
As like Hermione as is her picture,
Affront his eye."
Act v. sc. 1.
and in Cymbeline ;
" Good my liege,
Your preparation can affront no less
Than what you hear of."
Act iv. sc. 3.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 39 ; K. p. 291.
" And though thou now confess, thou didst but jest
With my vex'd spirits, I cannot take a truce,
But they will quake and tremble all this day."
So the passage is pointed in the old eds., and, I believe,*
by all the modern editors, — directly against the sense. The
proper punctuation is, —
" And though thou now confess thou didst but jest,
With my vex'd spirits I cannot take a truce,
But they will quake and tremble all this day."
To take truce with is a common expression ;
" all this, uttered
With gentle breath, calm look, knees humbly bow'd,
Could not take truce with the unruly spleen
Of Tybalt," &c.
Romeo and Juliet, act iii. sc. 1.
" And with my father take a friendly truce."
Marlowe's Tamburlaine (Part First), act iv. sc. 4.
90 KING JOHN.
" Take truce a while with these immoderate mournings."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Coxcomb, act iv. sc. 4.
" Mean while (since hope hath taken race [read, says the list of
Errata, truce'} with sorrow)
For some few dayes that little time He borrow," &c.
Wither's Crums and Scraps, &c., 1661, p. 79.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 43 ; K. p. 295.
" O, that a man should speak those words to me !"
I am rather surprised that the commentators, in their rage
for discovering parallel passages, should have overlooked the
following one in Sydney's Arcadia : " O God (cried out Pyro-
cles) that thou wert a man that vsest these words vnto me !"
Lib. iii. p. 315, ed. 1598.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 44.
" What earthy name to interrogatories
Can task the free breath of a sacred king ?"
" Modem editors, since the time of Pope, have substituted
earthly for ' earthy,' an alteration not required." COLLIER.
Not required ! — In Richard the Second, act i. sc. 3, vol. iv.
125, Mr. Collier gives,
, " O ! thou, the earthly author of my blood ;"
and observes in a note, " The folio of 1623 reads earthy" It
happens that in the latter passage only one old copy has the
misprint, which in the former passage all the old copies ex-
hibit.
In Massinger's Duke of Milan, act v. sc. 2, Sforza says to
the Doctors, according to the old eds.,
" O you earthy gods,
You second natures," &c. :
but in a copy of 4to, 1623 (now in my possession), Massinger
has crossed out " earthy" with a pen, and written "earthly"
on the margin.
KING JOHN. 91
SCENE 1. — C. p. 46.
" O Lewis, stand fast ! the devil tempts thee here,
In likeness of a new untrimmed bride."
" A misprint may be suspected here. Theobald reads, ' and
trimmed,' in reference to Blanch's adornments." COLLIER.
Here Mr. Knight has no note.
On the word "untrimmed" we have about two pages of
annotation in the Var. Shakespeare. First comes Theobald's
conjecture. Then Warburton declares that "untrimmed"
means unsteady, and that the term is taken from navigation.
Next, Johnson, rejecting Warburton's explanation, seems to
approve of Theobald's alteration. We have then a long note
by Steevens, who pronounces the meaning of " an untrimmed
bride " to be 'a bride undrest, unattired,' that is (he mo-
destly says), "not absolutely naked:" he adds that Mr. Col-
lins supposes " untrimmed " to be equivalent to ' unadorned
with the usual pomp and formality of a nuptial habit/ and
that Mr. Toilet is of the same opinion. Malone brings up
the rear, and knows not whether to approve of Theobald's
correction or Collins's explanation.
Let the next editor of Shakespeare merely state that " un-
trimmed''' means 'virgin:' — without any comment, though I
now think it right to adduce the following passage, among
many others which might be cited ;
" his enemy,
That would have burnt his city here, and your house too,
Purloin'd your lordship's plate the duke bestow'd on you
For turning handsomely o' the toe, and trimm'd your virgins,
Trimmd 'em of a new cut, an't like your lordship,
'Tis ten to one, your wife too, and the curse is,
You had had no remedy against these rascals," &c.
Fletcher's Loyal Subject, act ii. sc. 1.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 48 ; K. p. 298.
" France, thou may'st hold a serpent by the tongue,
A cased lion by the mortal paw,
A fasting tiger safer by the tooth," £c.
92 KING JOHN.
"So the old copies, taking 'cased' in the sense of caged, for
which it was perhaps a misprint, the g having been read for a long
s by the compositor. Some editors would read chafed, but this sup-
poses a double error in the word." COLLIER.
With a full recollection of the passages cited by Steevens
and Malone to support this reading (" cas'd"), I think it deci-
dedly wrong. Shakespeare would not have used " cased" in the
forced sense of caged, because in his time " a cased lion" meant
properly, ' a lion stript of his skin, flayed :' so in All's well
that ends well, " We'll make you some sport with the fox, ere
we case him," Act iii. sc. 6 ; and in Beaumont and Fletcher's
Scornful Lady,
" then with my tiUer
Bring down your gibship, and then have you cas'd,
And hung up in the warren."
Act v. sc. 1 .
Mr. Knight prints, " A chased lion." But the right read-
ing is undoubtedly " chafd :" in the following passage of
Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster, where the 4to of 1620 has
" Chafd," the other eds. have " Chast," and (let it be particu-
larly observed) " Cast ;"
" And what there is of vengeance in a lion
Chafd among dogs or robb'd of his dear young," &c.
Act v. sc. 3.
I may add, that in Shakespeare's Henry VIII. we find,
" so looks the chafed lion
Upon the daring huntsman that has gall'd him," &c.
Act iii. sc. 2.
and in Fletcher's Loyal Subject,
" He frets like a chafd lion." Act v. sc. 3.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 55 ; K. p. 305.
" So, by a roaring tempest on the flood,
A whole armado of convicted sail
Is scatter'd, and disjoin'd from fellowship."
"i. e. of conquered sail. In Minshew's Dictionary, 1617, as quoted
by Malone, we read ' To convict or convince:1 a Lat. convictus, over-
come. In < Love's Labour's Lost,' vol. ii. p. 377, we have ' convince/
KING JOHN. 93
used in the sense of overcome. Webster in his ' Appius and Virginia'
uses convince for convict. Edit. Dyce, vol. ii. p. 241." COLLIER.
Qy. did Shakespeare write " convected," (from the Latin
convectus) ? the next line,
" Is scatter'd, and disjoin'd from fellowship,"
seems to render it probable.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 56 ; K. p. 306.
" O ! that my tongue were in the thunder's mouth ;
Then with a passion would I shake the world,
And rouse from sleep that fell anatomy,
Which cannot hear a lady's feeble voice,
Which scorns a modern invocation."
" i. e. a common or ordinary invocation." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight prints,
" Which scorns a mother's invocation ;"
and observes ;
" The reading of the original, which has been constantly followed,
is modern — trite, common. Thus, in ' As You Like It/
' Full of wise saws and modern instances.'
This is the only explanation we can give if we retain the word modern.
But the sentence is weak, and a slight change would make it power-
ful. We may read ' a mother's invocation' with little violence to the
text : moder's (the old spelling) might have been easily mistaken for
modern."
Mr. Knight's alteration is one of the rashest ever attempted
by an editor. He had apparently forgotten the following
passage in Romeo and Juliet ;
" Why follow' d not, when she said — Tybalt's dead,
Thy father, or thy mother, nay, or both,
Which modern lamentation might have mov'd ?"
Act iii. sc. 2.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 58.
" There's nothing in this world, can make me joy :
Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale,
Vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man ;
94 KING JOHN.
And bitter shame hath spoil'd the sweet word's taste,
That it yields nought, but shame, and bitterness."
" Malone understands 'word' here to refer to life, and as such
may be the sense, we prefer the old text, although Pope, with much
plausibility, altered ' word's' to world's." COLLIER.
Malone's explanation is sheer foolishness. The misprint of
word for world is one of the most common errors not only in
early, but in modern books.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 63.
" The iron of itself, though heat red-hot,
Approaching near these eyes would drink my tears,
And quench this fiery indignation,
Even in the matter of mine innocence."
" Such is the reading of the old copies, unnecessarily altered in
modern editions to 'his fiery indignation.' 'This fiery indignation'
refers to the iron ' heat red-hot' of a line just preceding : that was
the fiery indignation which was to be quenched." COLLIER.
As usual, Mr. Collier patronises a mere misprint. If the
iron had been on the stage (and as yet the attendants have not
brought it in), the reading " this," though very questionable,
might perhaps have been tolerated.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 68.
" Some reasons of this double coronation
I have possess'd you with, and think them strong ;
And more, more strong than lesser is my fear,
I shall indue you with : mean time," &c.
" The first folio has then for ' than,' the commonest mode of print-
ing the word in the time of Shakespeare ; but the commentators not
adverting to this circumstance do not seem to have understood the
passage, and printed ' when lesser is my fear/ putting it in paren-
theses : the meaning, however, seems to be, that the king will here-
after give his lords reasons ' stronger than his fear was lesser :' the
comparative ' lesser' is put for the positive little, because the poet had
used ''more strong' in the preceding part of the line." COLLIER.
KING JOHN. 95
Such a portentous reading, and such a super-astute ex-
planation, were perhaps never before exhibited in any critical
edition of an author either ancient or modern : — and all be-
cause Mr. Collier would not alter " then" to " when," — the
latter word being as certainly the right lection here, as it is
in a passage at p. 412 of the same volume, where he has not
scrupled to substitute it for " that" of the old copy.
ACT v.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 88.
" This apish and unmannerly approach,
This harness'd masque, and unadvised revel,
This unheard sauciness, and boyish troops,
The king doth smile at ; and is well prepar'd
To whip this dwarfish war, these pigmy arms,
From out the circle of his territories."
" So the old copies without exception, and we adhere to the
ancient and most intelligible text, notwithstanding Theobald's sug-
gestion, that 'unheard' ought to be unhaird. Some modern editors
have unscrupulously printed unhair'd, without the slightest intima-
tion that it was not the old reading." COLLIER.
To me it is so evident from the context that "unhair'd"
(i. e. beardless) is the true reading, that I should hardly blame
any editor who omitted to state that the word happens to be
misspelt in the old copies. Malone's remark that hair was
formerly often written hear, might be confirmed by many pas-
sages besides the following one ;
" But die their heare with sundrie subtill slights."
Epilogue to Gascoigne's Steele Glasse.
Faulconbridge-now expresses to the Dauphin that contempt
for him and his forces, with which in the preceding scene he
had spoken of him to the King ;
" shall a beardless boy,
A cocker'd silken wanton, brave our fields," &c.
p. 84.
96 KING JOHN.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 89.
" and to thrill, and shake,
Even at the crying of your nation's crow"
" Malone thinks that this line refers to ' the voice or caw of the
French crow/ but Douce truly contends that the allusion is to the
' crow' of a cock, that being the national bird of France ; ' gallus
meaning both a cock and a Frenchman.' " COLLIER.
Except those explanatory of customs, dress, &c., the notes
of Douce are nearly worthless. "Would Shakespeare (or any
other writer) employ such an expression as " the crying of the
crow [of a cock] ?"
97
KING RICHARD II.
[Vol. iv. COLLIER; vol. iv. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 116.
" K. Rich. Wrath-kindled gentleman) be rul'd by me.
Let's purge this choler without letting blood :
This we prescribe, though no physician ;
Deep malice makes too deep incision.
Forget, forgive ; conclude, and be agreed ;
Our doctors say this is no month to bleed."
" So all the quartos ; the king addressing himself to Norfolk,
who had just concluded his angry speech. The folio reads gentlemen ;
but Bolingbroke, merely as the accuser, was not so properly ' wrath-
kindled,' and, moreover, had had time to cool." COLLIER.
In the first place, whoever reads this scene with any atten-
tion will find that Bolingbroke is to the full as angry as Nor-
folk. Secondly, the fifth line of the present speech proves
that the preceding part of it is addressed to both the " wrath-
kindled gentlemen." Thirdly, the variations of the old eds. are
here of no moment : in those MS. early plays which I have had
an opportunity of examining, the contraction " gent." is often
put for " gentleman" " gentlemen" " gentlewoman" and " gen-
tlewomen ;" hence frequent mistakes in the printed copies. In
the following passage of Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful
Lady, act v. sc. 4,
" I have cast beyond your wit : that gentlewoman
Is your retainer Welford,"
(which, of course, is the right reading, Welford having been
disguised as a gentlewoman), the first 4to has " gent.," and the
later eds. (the abbreviation having been misunderstood) " gen-
tleman."
SCENE 3.— C. p. 129 ; K. p. 399.
** Baling . Norfolk, so fare, as to mine enemy. —
98 KING RICHARD II.
By this time, had the king permitted us,
One of our souls had wander'd in the air,
Banish' d this frail sepulchre of our flesh,
As now our flesh is banish' d from this land :
Confess thy treasons, ere thou fly the realm ;
Since thou hast far to go, bear not along
The clogging burden of a guilty soul."
" i. e. ' so fare as I wish my enemy to fare.' Our text is that
of all the quartos and the first folio ; and why the clear meaning and
ancient reading has been abandoned by the modern editors we know
not, excepting that the second folio misprints ' fare' farre. The
correct text makes the sense complete, which is otherwise left imper-
fect." COLLIER.
Supposing that the strange mode of expression (to which,
I apprehend, no parallel exists in our early writers], "so fare,
as to mine enemy," could really mean " so fare as I wish my
enemy to fare," — where is the propriety of such a wish on the
present occasion, and what connexion lias it with the rest of
Bolingbroke's speech ? The second folio corrected the error of
the earlier eds. to
" Norfolk, so far as to mine enemy," —
(i. e. so far I speak, — a not uncommon ellipsis), the line being
a prelude to what immediately follows. Ritson well observes
that " Bolingbroke only uses the phrase by way of caution,
lest Mowbray should tbink he was about to address him as a
friend."
Mr. Knight remarks ;
" Johnson's interpretation of this passage seems to be just :
' Norfolk, so far I have addressed myself to thee as to mine enemy ;
I now utter my last words with kindness and tenderness ; confess
thy treasons.' "
But I do not believe that the line contains any allusion to
what Bolingbroke has previously said ; and it certainly could
not express so much as Johnson would make it signify.
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 139.
" Landlord of England art thou now, not king :
KING RICHARD II. 99
Thy state of law is bondslave to the law,
And thou —
K. Rich. A lunatic lean-witted fool,
Presuming on an ague's privilege,
Dar'st with thy frozen admonition
Make pale our cheek," &c.
" This is the reading of all the quarto editions : the folio gives it
thus :—
' And—
Rich. And thou a lunatic lean-witted fool," £c."
COLLIER.
The preference given by Mr. Collier to the reading of the
quartos seems to me beyond measure injudicious, — a reading
which makes " thou " (meaning Richard) the nominative to
" Dar'st" (meaning Gaunt).
SCENE 1.— C. p. 140.
" And let them die, that age and sullens have,
For both hast thou, and both become the grave."
" This is the reading of all the old copies, and therefore to be
adopted ; but it may be doubted whether it be correct. In a MS.
common-place book of the time, already quoted, the couplet runs as
follows, under the head of ' Age and Fulness/
' And let them die, that age and fulness have,' &c.
' Sullens' might be easily misread by the compositor for fulness ; but,
nevertheless, what York says seems to show, that the King meant to
reproach Gaunt with ill- temper." COLLIER.
Why should the correctness of the text be doubted, be-
cause the writer of a common-place book (who, according to
Mr. Collier himself, cited from memory, p. 165,) has set down
by mistake " fullness," — a word which in none of its accepta-
tions would suit the present passage ?
Our early authors make frequent mention of " the sullens :"
so Lyly ; " like you, Pandion, who being sick of the sullens,
will seeke no friend." Sapho and Phao, sig. D 2, ed. 1584.
100 KING RICHARD II.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 163 ; K. p. 440.
" Discomfortable cousin ! know'st thou not,
That when the searching eye of heaven is hid
Behind the globe, and lights the lower world,
Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen,
In murders and in outrage, bloody here ;
But when from under this terrestrial ball
He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines,
And darts his light through every guilty hole,
Then murders, treasons, and detested sins,
The cloak of night being pluck' d from off their backs,
Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves ?"
" The quarto of 1597 has ' bouldy here,' which we may conjecture
was a misprint for bouldly, or boldly ; but all the subsequent editions
have ' bloody here.' ' Boldly here ' seems to accord better with the
simile/' COLLIER.
With such authority for printing " boldly," I indeed won-
der that Mr. Collier and the other modern editors should have
retained " bloody." Nothing can be plainer than that " boldly"
is put in opposition to " trembling" in the last line of this
glorious passage.
ACT V.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 208.
" And, speaking it, he wishtly look'd on me ;
As who should say,*ll&cT*"'
" So the quartos of 1597 and 1598; probably, as the context
shows, an abridgement of wishfully, for the sake of the metre. The
two later quartos and the folio read wistly, which is a different word,
meaning attentively, and sometimes silently." COLLIER.
There is not, and there could not be, such a word as
" wishtly .•" the " abridgement of wishfully" is wishly. Again,
when Mr. Collier says that wistly means sometimes attentively
and sometimes silently, he confounds two distinct words, —
wistly (from wis, wist), and whistly (from whist).
In the present passage the right reading is undoubtedly
"wistly :" see Richardson's Diet, in v. Wis, where "looketh
KING RICHARD II. 101
wistly upon it," — "those whom they look wistly upon," —
" more wistly eyed this gallant prisoner," — " when more wistly
they did her behold," are cited from various early writers : —
to which examples the following may be added ;
" The silly Asse so wistly then did view him."
Drayton's Moone-Calfe, p. 179, ed. 1627.
" If unto these
We closely presse
And wistly on them look," &c.
Wither' s Crums and Scraps, &c., 1661, p. 98.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 210 ; K. p. 488.
" My thoughts are minutes, and with sighs they jar,
Their watches on unto mine eyes the outward watch,
Whereto my finger, like a dial's point,
Is pointing still, in cleansing them from tears.
Now, sir, the sound, that tells what hour it is,
Are clamorous groans, that strike upon my heart,
Which is the bell."
" This [' My thoughts are minutes, and with sighs they jar,
Their watches on unto mine eyes the outward watch']
is the reading and pointing of the quartos, excepting that that of 1615
has There in the second line for ' Their :' the folio, 1623, follows the
three earliest quartos, and the folio of 1632 omits ' on/ and prints
' into* to. We have stated the original text thus particularly, on
account of the difficulty of extracting sense from the passage by any
of the old readings. The commentators gave up the attempt, and
Johnson reasonably supposed the passage to be corrupt. 'Jar' is
explained by the use of the same word in ' The Winter's Tale,' vol. iii.
p. 433, to signify the tick of a clock, and Steevens suggested that
' outward watch' meant the figure of a watchman, or watch, above
the dial-plate. Still, this will not explain what is intended by ' with
sighs they jar their watches on unto my eyes.' The reading of the
second line in the second folio is good measure, ' Their watches to
mine eyes, the outward watch,' but it does not clear the sense of the
passage.
" Here again
[' Now, sir, the sound, that tells what hour it is,
Are clamorous groans']
we must leave the text as it is found in every old edition. Ritson
102 KING RICHARD II.
suggests that ' sound' should be in the plural, which seems plausible ;
but what has ' sir' to do in the line, and whom is Richard address-
ing ? If we read for instead of ' sir,' a not unfrequent error, arising
from the long s and /having been confounded by the compositor, the
verb are will have no nominative, but that perhaps might be they or
' sounds' understood : —
' Now, for the sounds that tell what hour it is,
Are clamorous groans.'
This perhaps is the nearest point of explanation at which we can
arrive." COLLIER.
By putting a comma after "jar," Mr. Collier thickens the
obscurity of the passage, or rather, makes it nonsense. It
certainly means ' My thoughts jar (tick) their watches on unto
mine eyes, which are the outward watch' (the dial-plate, — as
Henley first rightly explained it). " Now, sir," is merely one
of those improprieties in soliloquy, of which not a few exam-
ples might be collected from our early dramatists : so in Chap-
man's Humorous Dayes Myrth, 1599, while Florila is alone
on the stage, her husband enters behind, unseen by her, and
commences a soliloquy thus : " Yea, mary, sir, now I must
looke about: now if her desolate [dissolute] proouer come
againe, shal I admit him to make farther triall ?" &c. sig. c 3 ;
and in Middleton's A Mad World, my Masters, Sir Bounteous,
who is the only person on the stage, observes, " An old man's
venery is very chargeable, my masters ; there's much cookery
belongs to't." Act iv. sc. 2— Works, ii. 390, ed. Dyce.
But do no similar improprieties occur in other plays of
SHAKESPEARE ? In the Two Gentlemen of Verona, Launce
soliloquizes thus ; " If I had not had more wit than he [my
dog], to take a fault upon me that he did, I think verily, he
had been hang'd for't : sure as I live, he had suffer'd for't. You
shall judge. He thrusts me himself," &c. Act iv. sc. 4, (vol. i.
154) : and in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Falstaff, while
soliloquizing at the Garter Inn, says, " The rogues slighted
me into the river with as little remorse as they would have
drowned a blind bitch's puppies [read, a bitch's blind puppies]
fifteen i' the litter ; and YOU may know by my size, that I
have a kind of alacrity in sinking," &c. Act iii. sc. 5 (vol. i.
238).
KING RICHARD II. 103
If the length of the second line be objected to, the read-
ing of the second folio may be adopted. Mr. Knight prints
"sounds that tell " but the alteration, I think, is hardly ne-
cessary.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 211 ; K. p. 489.
" Yet, blessing on his heart that gives it me I
For 'tis a sign of love, and love to Richard
Is a strange brooch in this all-hating world."
" i. e. says Malone, ' is as strange as a brooch, which is now no
longer worn ;' and we have already seen, in ' All's Well that ends
Well,' vol. ii. p. 212, that brooches were out of fashion, — 'just like
the brooch and tooth-pick, which wear not now' " COLLIER.
Mr. Knight's note is to the same effect : " love to Richard,"
it concludes, " is, therefore, called a strange brooch, a thing of
value out of fashion."
There is, I believe, no allusion here to brooches being
" out of fashion." The word " sign" in the preceding line
probably suggested the expression " a strange brooch :" ' it is
a sign of love ; and love to Richard is, amid so much hatred, a
strange feeling for any one to display, — as he would a brooch
or ornament.'
I may add, that " brooch" (about the precise meaning of
which Malone squabbled with Mason) was not unfrequently
used metaphorically for { ornament.' " These sonnes of Mars,
who in their times were the glorious Brooches of our Nation,
and admirable terrour to our Enemies." The World runnes
on Wheeles,-—Taylors Workes, p. 237, ed. 1630.
" Next dy'd old Charles, true honor'd Nottingham,
(The Brooch and honor of his house and name)."
Upon the Death of King James, — Ibid. p. 324.
104
FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV.
[Vol. iv. COLLIER ; vol. v. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 236; K. p. 29.
" for the nonce."
" A phrase of perpetual occurrence in the writers of the time ;
but the word ' nonce' is of disputed etymology. The meaning is, for
the occasion, and Gifford (Ben Jonson, iii. 218) tells us that 'for the
nonce ' is simply for the once, the letter n having been inserted to
prevent elision in pronouncing for the once. There is little doubt
that he is right, though Tyrwhitt would derive it from nunc. Note
on Cant. Tales, v. 381." COLLIER.
The original form was doubtless the Saxon for than anes :
see Price's note on Warton's Hist, of Eng. Poet. ii. 496, ed.
1824, and Sir F. Madden's Gloss, to Syr Gawayne, &c.
I may notice here that (in comparatively recent writers)
the expression " for the once" is sometimes found : " In Dengy
Hundred, neare to Maldon, about the beginning of his Maies-
ties reigne, there fell out an extraordinary iudgement vpon
fiue or sixe that plotted a solemne drinking at one of their
houses, laid in Beare/or the once, drunke healths in a strange
manner, and died therof within a few weekes, some sooner,
and some later." Woe to Drunkards (a Sermon by S. Ward),
1622, p. 27.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 240 ; K. p. 33.
" Shall we buy treason, and indent with fears,
When they have lost and forfeited themselves ?"
" i. e. subscribe an indenture, as if under apprehension. This in-
terpretation accords with what Hotspur afterwards says of the king's
' trembling even at the name of Mortimer.' ' They,' in the next line,
refers to Mortimer, and others taken with him. This passage seems
to have puzzled nearly all the commentators ; and Warburton, John-
FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV. 105
son, and Steevens, have given explanations equally wide of the
mark." COLLIER.
There never, surely, was a more violent interpretation than
that " indent with fears' means " subscribe an indenture, as
if under apprehension!" — an interpretation which (to say no-
thing of the plural fears) is at once disproved by the earlier
part of the line. The king here speaks of " treason " AND of
"fears" of " buying" the former, and of " indenting with"
the latter. That "fears'" is equivalent to ( objects of fear,' I
have not the smallest doubt : compare Beaumont and Fletcher's
Valentinian ;
" 'Twas time to look about : if I must perish,
Yet shall my fears [i. e. the objects of my fear] go foremost."
Act iv. sc. 1.
Mr. Knight prints ;
" Shall we buy treason ? and indent \vithferes," &c.
and " explains his reasons for the change in the 6th Illustra-
tion to this act," — "reasons" of enormous length, and about
as satisfactory as his "reasons" for printing "stayers of sand"
in The Merchant of Venice (see p. 56). " Neque in mea po-
testate est ut temperem a risu, neque in tua ut me prohibeas.
Quid audio ex te, Titi [Knighti] ?"
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 248.
" Peas and beans are as dank here as a dog."
" The Rev. Mr. Barry suggests to me, that we should read dock
for ' dog,' the error having easily arisen from the mishearing of the
word." COLLIER.
An unhappy " suggestion ;" for " as wet as a dog" is an
expression still in use.
The following passage is recommended to the notice of
the Rev. Mr. Barry ;
" But many pretty ridiculous aspersions are cast vpon Dogges, so
that it would make a Dogge laugh to heare and vnderstand them :
As I haue heard a Man say, I am as hot as a Dogge, or, as cold as a
106 FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV.
Dogge ; I sweat like a Dogge, (when indeed a Dog never sweates),
as drunke as a Dogge, hee swore like a Dogge ; and one told a Man
once, That his Wife was not to be beleeu'd, for shee would lye like
a Dogge," &c. The World runnes on Wheeles, p. 232, — Taylor's
Workes, ed. 1630.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 274.
" Harry, I do not only marvel where thou spendest thy time,
but also how thou art accompanied : for though the camomile, the
more it is trodden on, the faster it grows, so youth, the more it is
wasted, the sooner it wears."
" The folio and the later quartos read yet, and thus spoil in
some degree the non-appropriateness of the simile, in which the joke
may be said to consist. Malone and the modern editors adopt yet."
COLLIER.
Few things in Mr. Collier's Shakespeare have struck me
with so much astonishment as this.
" Malone and the modern editors" followed the folio and
the later quartos, because "though" in the preceding part of
the sentence proved that "yet" must be the right reading, —
because Farmer had shewn that the style immediately ridi-
culed is that of Lyly in his Euphues, where we find ; " THOUGH
the Camomill the more it is troden and pressed downe, the
more it spreadeth, YET the Violet the oftner it is handled and
touched, the sooner it withereth and decayeth" (sig. c 3, ed.
n. d.), — and because they never imagined that Shakespeare
intended the acute Falstaff (even when fooling) to blunder
like the addle-pated Dogberry.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 274 ; K. p. 67.
" Shall the blessed sun of heaven prove a micher, and eat black-
berries ?"
' The allusion,' says Johnson, ' is to a truant boy, who, un-
willing to go to school, and afraid to go home, lurks in the fields,
and picks wild fruits.' " COLLIER.
In a little volume recently published we find ; " MOOCHER.
FIRST PART OF KIN,G HENRY IV. 107
A truant; ' a blackberry moucher"1 — a boy who plays truant
to pick blackberries." Akerman's Glossary of Provincial
Words and Phrases in use in Wiltshire.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 277.
" Exeunt Hostess, FRANCIS, and BARDOLPH."
Earlier in this scene (p. 263) is ;
" Fran. Anon, anon, sir. [Exit."
on which " Exit" Mr. Collier rather unnecessarily observes ;
" The modern editors make Francis properly re-enter, but they
never inform us at what point he goes out again."
In the present passage Mr. Collier sends Francis off the
stage, without having previously marked his entrance.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 288.
" Hot. I had rather hear, lady, my brach, howl in Irish."
Is it possible that Mr. Collier could suppose that " lady "
was an address to Lady Percy ? The proper punctuation of
the speech is ;
" I had rather hear Lady, my brach, howl in Irish, —
" Lady " being the name of the brach.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 299.
" the prince is a Jack, a sneak- cup."
" So spelt in the old copies ; but it maybe doubted whether it be
not in fact the same word as ' snick-up,' a mere term of contempt.
See 'Twelfth-Night/ Vol. iii. p. 356, note 6." COLLIER.
Mr. Collier (see the note to which he refers) has been
misled by Steeveiis. The two words are quite distinct : snick-
up is merely an exclamation, equivalent to ' be hanged;' sneak-
cup is plainly ' one who sneaks from his cup.'
108 FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 305 ; K. p. 102.
" The quality and hair of our attempt
Brooks no division."
" Johnson thought that ' hair' was to be taken for complexion,
character, and Steevens and Malone agreed with him. Boswell re-
commended the substitution of air ; but no change seems necessary.
Worcester, perhaps, means that there ought to be no splitting or
division of their power, already small enough for the attempt : ' the
hair of our attempt brooks no division.' " COLLIER.
Mr. Collier merely explains the passage wrongly: Mr.
Knight rashly alters "hair" to "air!"
To the quotations already adduced in defence of Johnson's
explanation (see the Var. Shakespeare) I have to add, not only
" A lady of my hair cannot want pitying."
Fletcher's Nice Valour, act i. sc. 1.
but also another passage which proves indisputably that the
Doctor was right.
In the play of Sir Thomas More (MS. Harl. 7368), a fellow
named Faulkner is brought in custody before Sir Thomas ; and
when the said Faulkner, — who in consequence of a vow wears
his hair very long, — tells Sir Thomas that he is servant to a
secretary, we find (fol. 12) ;
" Moore. A fellow of your haire is very fitt
To be a secretaries follower !" —
Sir Thomas using the word with a quibble, — ' grain, texture,
complexion, character.'
ACT V.
SCENE l.—C. p. 320 ; K. p. 117.
"What is honour? A word. What is in that word, honour?
What is that honour? Air. A trim reckoning ! — Who hath it ? He
that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it ? No. Doth he hear it ?
No," &c.
" Our reading is that of the two earliest editions. The quarto of
1608 reads, 'What is that word honour? What is that honour?
FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV. 109
Air;' and the quarto, 1613, only 'What is that word, honour? Air.'
This last is the text adopted by the folio, 1623." COLLIER.
The reading of 4to, 1613, and of the folio is evidently the
true one ; and has been adopted by Mr. Knight. The earlier
readings are not in harmony with the brevity and precision of
the rest of this " catechism," and must have originated in the
mistake of some transcriber who had written the interrogatory
twice.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 327 ; K. p. 122.
" Fal. Well, if Percy be alive, I'll pierce him. If he do come in
my way, so : if he do not, if I come in his, willingly, let him make a
carbonado of me."
Mr. Knight prints ;
" Fal. If Percy be alive I'll pierce him, if he do come in my way,
so : if he do not," &c.
and remarks; "We have altered the punctuation of this pas-
sage, believing that the ' so ' applies to some action of Falstaff
with his bottle of sack — perhaps thrusting his sword into the
cork;" — without any mention of the illustrious Zachary Jack-
son, who expressly says, " I should imagine it stood originally
thus : ' Well, if Percy be alive, I'll pierce him if he do come
in my way, so!' (Here he uses the soldiers cork-skrew ; runs
the point of his sword into the cork}."
That this Jackson-Knightian punctuation grossly corrupts
the passage is proved, not only by two speeches of Falstaff 'in
the next scene ;
"There is Percy; if your father will do me any honour, so; if
not, let him kill the next Percy himself."
" If I may be believed, so ; if not, let them that should reward
valour bear the sin upon their own heads."
but also by innumerable passages in early dramas, besides the
following ;
" Well, and you do not like my humour, I can be but sory for
it: I bit you for good will, and if you accept it, so ; if no[t], go."
Chapman's Humorous Dayes Myrth, 1599, sig F 2.
110 FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV.
" If I escapte [sic] vnseene, why so it is ;
If not, I care not much, it is but so," &c.
Belchier's Hans Beer -pot, His Invisible Comedie, &c.
1618, sig F 3.
Ill
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV.
[Vol. iv. COLLIER ; vol. v. KNIGHT.]
ACT 11.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 384.
" Pist. I'll see her damned first; — to Pluto's damned lake, by
this hand, to the infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile also.
Hold hook and line, say I. Down ! down, dogs ! down fates."
" The quarto has faters ; the folio, fates ; a difference that seems
to have been passed over without notice, excepting by Boswell ; and
the commentators have given themselves the trouble to explain faters
asfaitours, when in fact it is a mere misprint for 'fates.' Pistol has
been talking of Pluto and Erebus, and he very consistently threatens
to hurl down the ' fates.' " COLLIER.
In the first place, I cannot perceive the "consistency"
which, Mr. Collier says, is given to Pistol's speech by the
reading, "fates:" Pistol has indeed "been talking of Pluto
and Erebus ;" but he has uttered no threats against those
formidable powers, — he has only talked of seeing Doll damned
down to them. Secondly, the juxta-position of "dogs" and
"fates" in one short sentence, "Down! down, dogs! down
fates," is not a little extraordinary.
I believe that the reading of tbe quarto, "faters" (i. e.
faitours), is decidedly right, and that the "fates" of the folio
is either a misprint, or, more probably, an alteration of the
editor, who happened not to understand the rather affected
term which Shakespeare had put with such propriety into the
mouth of Pistol. I ought to add, that the word "faitour" is
found not unfrequently, and with various spelling, in other
writers of the time.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 389.
" What stuff wilt have a kirtle of?"
" It does not seem at all settled what was a kirtle : our lexico-
graphers say that it means ' a gown, a jacket, a petticoat, a mantle,
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV.
a cloak,' and passages in our old authors may be produced to show
that it was each of these," &c. COLLIER.
Gifford has " settled" the matter in an excellent note on
Jonson's Works, ii. 260.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 391.
" P. Hen. For the women ?
Fal. For one of them, she is in hell already, and burns, poor
souls. For the other, I owe her money, and whether she be damned
for that, I know not."
" We ought probably to read a [hell] for ' in [hell] ;' but the old
editions are uniform. Sir T. Hanmer prints ' poor soul,' as if the
words applied to Doll." COLLIER.
To the Prince's question concerning " the women," Falstaff
here replies distinctly in two short sentences, the first sentence
commencing with "For one of them" (i. e. Doll), and the
second with "For the other" (i. e. Mrs. Quickly) ; yet though
the first of these sentences relates wholly to Doll, Mr. Collier
is not startled at finding in it the words, " poor souls," applied
to both the women ! From his note the reader would naturally
suppose that Sir T. Hanmer alone had printed " poor soul :"
the fact is, that every editor since Hanmer's time, except Mr.
Collier himself, has adopted a correction, which Johnson pro-
nounced to be " undoubtedly right," and which one wonders
how the earlier editors could have failed to make. Falstaff
calls Doll " poor soul," because she was " in hell already ;"
about Mrs. Quickly 's damnation he is uncertain.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 393.
" Bard. [Within.'] Mistress Tear-sheet,—
Host. What's the matter 1
Bard. [Within."] Bid mistress Tear-sheet come to my master.
Host. O! run, Doll, run; run, good Doll. Come. — She comes
blubbered. — Yea — will you come, Doll ? [Exeunt."
"These words ['Come. — She comes blubbered. — Yea — will you
come, Do//.9'], partly addressed to Doll, and partly to Bardolph within,
are only found in the quarto. There can be no sufficient reason for
omitting them, as has been done by modern editors." COLLIER.
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV. 113
In restoring these words from the quarto, Mr. Collier has
made a mistake which I should hardly have expected. " She
comes blubbered" instead of being addressed to Bardolph
within, is obviously a stage-direction, which (as very fre-
quently happens in early dramas) has crept into the text by
an error of the transcriber or printer.
" She comes blubbered" means merely that the boy who
acted Doll was 'to come in a Jit of weeping :' formerly, the
word " blubbered" did not convey the ludicrous idea which it
does at present ;
" When her arms,
Able to lock Jove from a synod, shall
By warranting moonlight corslet thee ; oh, when
Her twinning cherries shall their sweetness fall
Upon thy tasteful lips, what wilt thou think
Of rotten kings or blubber' d queens ?"
The Two Noble Kinsmen, act i. sc. 1.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 394; K. p. 189.
" Then, happy low, lie down !
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown."
On this passage, — containing the singular expression " happy
low," and " lie" followed almost immediately by " lies," — Mr.
Collier makes no comment, as if its integrity had never been
questioned. The conjecture of Warburton at least (which was
adopted by Johnson) ought to be mentioned by every editor of
Shakespeare. In a note on Lucretius, Gilbert Wakefield tells
us (and his veracity is not to be impeached) that the very same
correction had occurred to himself: " Unde virum elegantissi-
mum, Shakespeari nostri sospitatorem, et mihi amicissimum
[Steevens], mirari soleo, ad partem ii. Henrici IV. iii. l.'vul-
gata, insulsorum omnium longe insulsissima, defendentem ;
postquam vere Warburtonus emendaverat, quod et ipse seorsim
perspexeram> ad hunc modum ;
Then, happy lowlie clown !
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown :
ubi similis literarum cl adhoesio lectionem vitiosissimam, low
i
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV.
lie down, pepererat ; quam futuram esse expectavisses tarn
lepido ingenio terriculum." Ad Lib. ii. 1035. When I add,
that a passage of a song in Beaumont and Fletcher's Captain
(act iii. sc. 4), which stands as follows in the old eds.,
" For ever will I sleep, while poor maids cry,
Alas, for pity, stay,
And let us die
With thee ! men cannot mock us in the day,"
(" day" being an obvious misprint for " clay") ; and that a line
in Sec. Part of King Henry VI. act iv. sc. 1,
" Obscure and lowly swain, King Henry's blood," &c.
may both be cited in confirmation of Warburton's conjecture,
I must not be understood as if recommending its adoption into
the text.
The old reading is at least preferable to that given by Mr.
Knight ;
" Then, happy low-lie-down !"
an emendation of Coleridge, who had persuaded himself that
the words were " either a proverbial expression, or the burthen
of some old song." In the higher department of criticism,
Coleridge was indeed mighty ; but as a verbal critic, he was
among the very worst.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 402.
" Fal. Well said, good woman's tailor ! well said, courageous
Feeble ! Thou wilt be as valiant as the wrathful dove, or most mag-
nanimous mouse. — Prick the woman's tailor. Well, master Shallow,
deep master Shallow."
Surely, Mr. Collier (who appears to have been misled by
the quartos) would never have given this very erroneous punc-
tuation, instead of "Prick the woman's tailor well, master
Shallow ; deep, master Shallow," — if he had recollected that
Falstaff, a little after, desires Shallow to "prick Bullcalf
till he roar."
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV. 1 15
ACT IV.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 414.
" Then take, my lord of Westmoreland, this schedule,
For this contains our general grievances :
Each several article herein redress'd ;
All members of our cause, both here and hence,
That are insinew'd to this action,
Acquitted by a true substantial form ;
And present execution of our wills
To us, and to our purposes, confind ;
We come within our awful banks again,
And knit our powers to the arm of peace."
" So both the quarto and folio editions ; and there is no need of
alteration, though Johnson proposed consigned, and it has found its
way into all modern editions : the meaning is, ' the execution of our
wills being confined, or restricted, to us and to our purposes.' " COL-
LIER.
When Mr. Collier brought back into the text the nonsen-
sical reading, " confin'd," it would almost seem as if Malone's
note ad loc., in which the following passages are adduced, had
entirely escaped his eye ;
11 And, (God consigning to my good intents)
No prince nor peer shall have just cause to say,
God shorten Harry's happy life one day."
Act v. sc. 2, of the present play.
" And take with you free power to ratify,
Augment or alter, as your wisdoms best
Shall see advantageable for our dignity,
Any thing in or out of our demands ;
And we'll consign thereto."
King Henry V. act v. sc. 2.
" It were, my lord, a hard condition for a maid to consign to."
Id. ibid.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 426.
" As humorous as winter, and as sudden
As flaws congealed in the spring of day."
Alluding,' says Warburton, ' to the opinion of some philoso-
116 SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV.
pliers, that the vapours being congealed in the air by cold, (which is
most intense towards the morning), and being afterwards rarified and
let loose by the warmth of the sun, occasion those sudden and impe-
tuous gusts of wind which are called flaws." COLLIER.
An interpretation altogether wrong, as the epithet here
applied to " flaws" might alone determine, — " congealed gusts
of wind" being no where mentioned among the phenomena of
nature except in Baron Munchausen's Travels.
Edwards rightly explained " flaws" in the present passage
— " small blades of ice." I have myself heard the word used
to signify both thin cakes of ice and the bursting of those cakes.
117
KING HENRY V.
[Vol. iv. COLLIER ; vol. v. KNIGHT.]
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 483.
" Quick [NYM draws his sword.'] O well-a-day,
lady ! if he be not hewn now ! — we shall see wilful adultery and mur-
der committed.
Bard. Good lieutenant — good corporal, offer nothing here."
In this passage Mr. Collier adheres to the folio, perceiving
none of those difficulties which compelled the other modern
editors to deviate from its text.
The reading, " if he be not hewn now ! " is evidently a
misprint for, " if he be not drawn now !" (compare Beaumont
and Fletcher's Valentinian^ act iv. sc. 4, where the cowardly
Licinius, seeing Ae'cius with his sword in his hand, exclaims,
" He's drawn ;
By Heaven, I dare not do it ! "
and Romeo and Juliet, act i. sc. 1,
" What ! art thou drawn among these heartless hinds ?")
In what follows there is also manifest error; for "good
lieutenant" cannot possibly be addressed to ancient Pistol by
Bardolph, who in Henry V. is himself the lieutenant : Mr.
Collier, however, is satisfied with all this intolerable confusion ;
" the first part of the speech," he assures us, " is addressed to
Pistol, though called f lieutenant,' " — leaving us to conclude
that Bardolph had suddenly forgotten the exact military rank
of his intimate associate, whom previously in the present scene
he has twice termed " ancient Pistol " !
I must here notice a passage in act iii. sc. 6, where Flu-
ellen, speaking of Pistol, says, according to the folio, " There
is an ancient lieutenant there at the pridge," &c., and accord-
ing to the quarto, merely, " There is an ensign [equivalent
to ancient] there," &c. Malone printed, " There is an ensign
118 KING HENRY V.
there at the pridge," &c. ; and Mr. Knight gives, " There is
an ancient there at the pridge," &c. But Mr. Collier prefers
the reading of the folio, and points the words thus (p. 514),
" There is an ancient, lieutenant, there at the pridge," &c. —
a punctuation which makes " lieutenant" apply to the person
addressed by Fluellen, viz. Gower, who throughout the play
is repeatedly termed " captain"! Mr. Knight (p. 351) asks,
" is the blunder of ' ancient lieutenant' that of Fluellen, or
of the printer ?" The probability is, that the transcriber had
originally written by mistake " lieutenant," for which he had
afterwards substituted " ancient ;" and that, the word " lieute-
nant" being imperfectly deleted, the printer retained it as well
as the correction.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 503.
" Pist. And I :
If wishes would prevail with me,
My purpose should not fail with me,
But thither would I hie,
Boy. As duly, but not as truly, as bird doth sing on bough."
It may be doubted whether the boy's speech be a conti-
nuation of the song just cited by Pistol ; but there can be no
doubt that it is a portion of some song, and that it ought there-
fore to be printed (as Mr. Knight gives it at Douce's sugges-
tion) as verse.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 504.
" I knew by that piece of service the men would carry coals."
" The origin of the expression was probably the low occupation of
colliers in former times, which rendered ' collier' a term of abuse."
COLLIER.
This expression contains an allusion, not to colliers, but to
carriers of coals. In the royal residences and great houses the
lowest drudges appear to have been selected to carry coals to
the kitchens, halls, &c. ; see note on Jonson's Works, ii. ] 69,
by Gilford, who afterwards (p. 179) observes, " From the mean
nature of this occupation it seems to have been somewhat
KING HENRY V. 119
hastily concluded, that a man who would carry coals would
submit to any indignity." In Lyly's Midas mention is made
of " one of the Cole house" (sig. F 4, ed. 1592), i. e. one of
the drudges ahout the palace of King Midas.
" Gow. Captain Fluellen, you must come presently to the mines :
the duke of Gloster would speak with you.
Flu. To the mines ; tell you the duke/' &c.
I should have supposed that the erroneous pointing in
Fluellen's speech, — which ought to stand, " To the mines!
tell you the duke," &c., — was only a printer's mistake (like
that which occurs in a subsequent speech of Fluellen, where a
comma is interposed between a noun and its immediately fol-
lowing verb, — "fortune, is an excellent moral," p. 514), had
not various other passages in this edition (see, for instance,
the fourth speech of Orleans at p. 523) indicated something
like a systematic rejection of the exclamation-point.
SCENE 7.— C. p. 521.
" in your strait trossers."
" The old copy (as Malone states) reads strossers. The correc-
tion was made by Theobald," &c. COLLIER.
" The correction" ! We repeatedly find the form strosser
in our early writers.
" Nor the Danish sleeve sagging down like a Welch wallet, the
Italian's close strosser, nor the French standing collar." Dekker's
Gull's Hornbook, p. 40, reprint, 1812.
" Or, like a toiling usurer, sets his son a-horseback in cloth- of-
gold breeches, while he himself goes to the devil a-foot in a pair of
old strossers." Middleton's No Wit, No Help like a Woman's, act ii.
sc. 1, — Works, v. 40, ed. Dyce.
ACT IV.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 546.
Shame, and eternal shame, nothing but shame !
Let us die : — in ! — Once more back again," &c.
120 KING HENRY V.
"Thus the line stands in the folio, and seems to require no altera-
tion. Bourbon is urging his companions to return to the battle,
' Let us die : in !' that is, ' let us in,' and * once more back to the
fight.' The line consists, it is true, of only nine syllables, but we
have many such in Shakespeare ; and the time is amply made up by
the proper pauses after the exhortations, ' Let us die : — in !' — Theo-
bald reads very lamely, ' Let us die instant / and Malone very need-
lessly, ' Let us die in fight.' " COLLIER.
This is not the only note in Mr. Collier's edition to which
the remark of a very learned and judicious critic might be well
applied ; " An interpreter, who can make his way through
such a difficulty as this, will scarcely find anything in language
to arrest his course." (Eurip. Iphig. in Aul. p. 169, ed. Cant.
1840.)
In the folio the line stands thus (without the colon, breaks,
and exclamation-point, which Mr. Collier has added in the
vain attempt to render it intelligible) ;
" Let vs dye in once more backe againe,"
a word being evidently omitted ; and several years have now
elapsed since the true reading,
" Let us die in honour : once more back again,"
was restored by Mr. Knight (in his Pictorial Shakspere) from
the corresponding scene of the quarto, where we find ;
" Lets dye with honor, our shame doth last too long."
See Mr. Knight's very satisfactory note ad loc.
ACT V.
SCENE 1.— C. p 563.
" Pist. Doth fortune play the huswife with me now ?
News have I, that my Doll is dead i' the spital
Of malady of France ;
And there my rendezvous is quite cut off."
" So the folio, confirmed by the quarto editions. Modern editors
(some without any notice) substitute Nell for ' Doll.' It was much
more likely that Doll Tearsheet would follow the army to France,
than Nell Quickly, who had been left in England to manage the
business of the tavern during Pistol's absence." COLLIER.
KING HENRY V. 121
In the Second Part of King Henry IV. , when the Drawer
announces that Pistol is below, Doll Tearsheet fires at the
very name of " the swaggering rascal ;" soon after his entrance,
she assails him with a torrent of abuse ; nor is she satisfied till
he has been thrust down stairs (act ii. sc. 4). In the present
play Pistol figures as the husband of" the quondam Quickly ;"
he calls her "MY NELL" (act ii. sc. 1) ; scornfully bids Nym
espouse Doll Tearsheet (ibid.) ; and takes a very affectionate
leave of his own wife on departing for France (act ii. sc. 3).
All this, however, — the enmity between Doll Tearsheet and
Pistol, and the marriage of Pistol and Mrs. Quickly, — weighs
nothing with Mr. Collier, and he here deliberately replaces
"Doll" in the text!
From the earlier scenes of this play it is quite evident that
neither Doll nor Nell had ever quitted England; and I can
only suppose that when Mr. Collier made his strange remark
about Doll's " following the army to France," he had forgotten
that " malady of France " (morbus Gallicus) was a term com-
monly used, not only in our own country, but all over Europe.
In short, Pistol means that he has received from England
the news of Mrs. Quickly 's death, and that consequently he
has no longer a home at the comfortable tavern in Eastcheap.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 565.
" Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart,
Unpruned dies : her hedges even-pleached,
Like prisoners wildly over- grown with hair,
Put forth disorder'd twigs : her fallow leas
The darnel, hemlock, and rank fumitory,
Doth root upon, while that the coulter rusts,
That should deracinate such savagery :
The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth
The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover,
Wanting the scythe, all uncorrected, rank,
Conceives by idleness, and nothing teems,
But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs,
Losing both beauty and utility ;
And all our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges,
Defective in their natures, grow to wildness.
KING HENRY V.
Even so our houses, and ourselves, and children,
Have lost, or do not learn, for want of time,
The sciences that should become our country,
But grow, like savages, — as soldiers will,
That nothing do but meditate on blood, —
To swearing, and stern looks, diffus'd attire,
And every thing that seems unnatural."
" The folio has ' all,' which modern editors, from not attending
to the old punctuation, have needlessly changed to as." COLLIER.
According to the monstrous reading and punctuation
which are here brought back into the text, Burgundy first
dwells on the wretched state of the country, — of its vines 9
hedges , fallow leas, and meads, — and then, AS IF HE HAD
NEVER EVEN MENTIONED THEM, adds ;
" And all our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges,
Defective in their nature, grow to wildness " ! ! !
That the following is the shape in which the passage came
from the pen of Shakespeare, who, except Mr. Collier, will
for a moment doubt ?
" And as our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges,
Defective in their natures, grow to wildness ;
Even so our houses, and ourselves, and children,
Have lost, or do not learn, for want of time,
The sciences that should become our country," &c.
The alteration of" all" to " as " was first made by Roderick,
a fellow of Magdalen College, Cambridge, and a friend of
Edwards, the author of the Canons of Criticism.
123
FIRST PART OF KING HENRY VI.
[Vol. v. COLLIER ; vol. v. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 9 ; K. p. 444.
" Posterity, await for wretched years,
When at their mothers' moist eyes babes shall suck,
Our isle be made a nourish of salt tears,
And none but women left to wail the dead."
" Pope substituted marish, i. e. marsh, for ' nourish/ which is the
word in the first and in all the other folios. In fact, no change is
required ; and had it been a misprint for marish, the editor of the
second folio, who had corrected the preceding line, would not have
been likely to pass it over. ' Nourish,' as Malone and Steevens
proved by various quotations anterior to the time of Shakespeare,
was only another form of the word nourice, or nurse; and a word of
two syllables was required." COLLIER.
Malone did not adduce any passages where the form
"nourish" occurs; but Steevens cited them from the romance
of Syr Eglamour, and Ly agate's Fall of Prynces, — with about
as much propriety as Grey quoted " kid" from Chaucer to
explain "kid-fox" in Much ado about Nothing (see p. 32).
Malone, indeed, cited another form of the word, "nourice,"
from Spenser, who, as every reader knows, was a great af-
fecter of archaisms, and employed a variety of words which
had long become obsolete.
Mr. Knight also retains " nourish." — But what is the
meaning of " Our isle be made a nourish [or nurse] of salt
tears ? " Theobald (out of sheer opposition to Pope) attempted
to explain it, — " That the whole isle should be one common
nurse or nourisher of tears ; and those be the nourishment of
its miserable issue," — an interpretation at which Warburton
might well exclaim, " Was there ever such nonsense!"
In defence of Pope's correction, " marish," which I have
124 FIRST PART OF KING HENRY VI.
no doubt is the genuine reading (the original compositor
having mistaken ma for nou), Ritson very appositely quoted
from Kyd's Spanish Tragedy;
" Made mountains marsh with spring tides of my tears."
SCENE 3. — C. p. 21.
" Win. Gloster, thou'lt answer this before the pope.
Glo. Winchester goose! I cry — a rope ! a rope !"
" Johnson would here make out an allusion to the ' consequence
of love' for the inhabitants of the Stews, under the control of the
bishop of Winchester : that ' consequence ' was certainly called ' a
Winchester goose' by many old writers (see Dyce's Webster's
Works, vol. iii. p. 328), but there is no necessary reference to it in
the text. ' Winchester goose !' seems merely used as a term of
abuse." COLLIER.
Various words of reproach, — such as lurdan, ribald, &c. &c.
— were formerly used without any reference to their original
significations ; but " Winchester goose " (even if it had not
been applied to the Bishop of Winchester) was too peculiar
an expression to be ever employed as a general term of abuse.
Gloster means here to taunt Winchester with his licentious
life : he afterwards tells him ;
" such is thy audacious wickedness,
Thy lewd, pestiferous, and dissentious pranks,
As very infants prattle of thy pride.
Thou art a most pernicious usurer,
Fro ward by nature, enemy to peace ;
Lascivious, wanton, more than well beseems
A man of thy profession, and degree."
Act iii. sc. 1, p. 48.
ACT in.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 56.
" Here enter'd Pucelle, and her practisants."
" The meaning is very obvious ; but I have not met with any
other instance of the use of the word. We might read partisans^ if
all the old copies did not agree in ' practisants.' " COLLIER.
FIRST PART OF KING HENRY VI. 125
It would almost seem that, when Mr. Collier offered this
unnecessary conjecture, he had not recollected the sense in
which practice is generally employed by our early writers,
viz. ' trick, artifice, treachery:' " her practisants " is equiva-
lent to ' her associates in treachery.'
SCENE 2.— C. p. 59 ; K. p. 496.
" Lost, and recover 'd in a day again !
This is a double honour, Burgundy ;
Yet heavens have glory for this victory."
Is not the right reading " Let " ?
ACT IV.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 76.
" from bought and sold lord Talbot ;
Who, ring'd about with bold adversity,
Cries out for noble York and Somerset,
To beat assailing death from his weak legions."
" The folios have regions ; most probably, though not necessarily,
an error, which was corrected by Howe." COLLIER.
This is one of the notes in which Mr. Collier evinces a sort
of kindly feeling towards the misprints of the old copies, dis-
missing them, when he does not receive them into the text,
with an express declaration that they may nevertheless be the
genuine readings. What arguments could be advanced in de-
fence of " regions," I cannot form even the most distant idea.
ACT V.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 96.
" Shep. Fie, Joan ! that thou wilt be so obstacle /"
" In various writers of the time of Shakespeare, and earlier, ' ob-
stacle' was used for obstinate. Steevens produces instances from
Chapman's ' May-Day,' 1611, and Chettle's 'Hoffman,' printed in
1631, but written about 30 years earlier : other proofs might be found
without much difficulty." COLLIER.
126 FIRST PART OF KING HENRY VI.
This note may mislead the reader. By the writers of
Shakespeare's time at least, " obstacle" is NEVER used for
obstinate, except when (as in the present line and in the
passages which Steevens cited) they intend it as a mark of
rusticity or vulgarity in the speaker.
127
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY VI.
[Vol. v. COLLIER ; vol. vi. KNIGHT.]
ACT i.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 112.
" Have you yourselves, Somerset, Buckingham,
Brave York, Salisbury, and victorious Warwick,
Receiv'd deep scars in France and Normandy ?
Or hath mine uncle Beaufort, and myself,
With all the learned council of the realm,
Studied so long, sat in the council-house
Early and late, debating to and fro
How France and Frenchmen might be kept in awe ?
And was his highness in his infancy
Crowned in Paris, in despite of foes ?"
" We have substituted ' was' for hath of the folio, 1623 : we have
thought this slight change, of one auxiliary verb for another, prefer-
able to the insertion of been in the second line, before ' crowned,'
which is of course to be read as a dissyllable, and is so printed in all
the old copies, showing the line to be complete. Steevens, and other
modern editors, add a new word, instead of merely correcting one
already found in the original text." COLLIER.
From what precedes, — " Have you yourselves/' &c., and
" Or hath mine uncle," &c. — there is more than a strong pro-
bability that the line,
" And hath his highness in his infancy,"
contains no misprint. The next line, therefore, ought surely
to stand,
" [Been] crown'd in Paris, in despite of foes."
That the folio happens to have " crowned" instead of "crown'd"
gives not the slightest support to Mr. Collier's alteration.
128 SECOND PART OF KING HENRY VI.
ACT II.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 148.
" Methinks, I should not thus be led along,
Mail'd up in shame, with papers on my back," &c.
" In ' Love's Labour's Lost/ vol. ii. p. 312, we have had mail or
male used for a bag or wallet ; and Johnson tells us, that 'Mail'd up
in shame' means ' wrapped up, bundled up in disgrace.' Possibly
however, ' mail' is here to be taken in the sense of armour, as if the
shame of the duchess inclosed her like a coat of mail." COLLIER.
Drayton makes the speaker of the above lines use the same
expression in an Epistle to her husband ;
" How could it be, those that were wont to stand
To see my pompe, so goddesse-like to land,
Should after see me may' Id vp in a sheet,
Doe shamefull penance three times in the street ?"
Elinor Cobham to Duke Humphrey, — England's
Her. Epist. ed. fol. p. 174.
In the passage of our text " shame" certainly alludes to the
sheet of penance ; and therefore the expression " mail'd up"
would seem to mean * wrapped up as a hawk is in a cloth :'
" Mail a hawk is to wrap her up in a handkerchief or other
cloath, that she may not be able to stir her wings or struggle."
R. Holme's Ac. of Armory, 1688, b. ii. p. 239. (A hawk was
sometimes mailed by pinioning her with a girth or band : see
Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster, act v. sc. 4). I must
allow, however, that " maiVd up in" are words applied to
armour ;
" have I stood
Mail'd up in steel, when my tough sinews shrunk," &c.
Beaumont and Fletcher's Captain, act ii. sc. 1.
4
My friend Mr. Halliwell was, no doubt, only joking when he
conjectured that in the present passage of Henry VI. the right
reading might be " maul'd" ! see his note on The First Sketches
of the Second and Third Parts of King Henry the Sixth, p. 91.
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY VI. 129
ACT III.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 159.
" for that is good deceit
Which mates him first, that first intends deceit."
" To mate is to destroy or confound, and in that sense it is often
used by Shakespeare, as well as by Greene, Peele, Drayton, &c. See
vol. ii. p. 142." COLLIER.
I incline to believe that Percy was right when he observed
that " mates" is used here with an allusion to chess-playing :
at all events, Ritson was wrong when he confidently asserted
that " to mate is no term in chess." Palsgrave, in his Lesclar-
cissement de la Lang. Fr., 1530, gives not only " I Mate or
ouercome, le amatte" but also " I Mate at the chesses, le
matte" fol. ccxcix. (Table of Verbes) ; and in the following
stanza of Sir John Harington's Orlando Furioso we have both
" amated" in the sense of confounded, and " mated" with an
allusion to chess ;
" The wound was great, but yet did greater show ;
Which sight faire Isabella much amated :
The Prince that seemed not the same to know,
With force increased rather then abated,
Vpon the Pagans brow gave such a blow
As would (no doubt) have made him checkt and mated,
Save that (as 1 to you before rehearst)
His armour was not easie to be pierst."
B. xxiiii. st. 55,— p. 193, ed. 1634.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 169.
" Oft have I seen a timely-parted ghost
Of ashy semblance," &c.
On this passage Mr. Collier has no note. — Steevens cites
several passages from early writers, in which, as in the text,
ghost means ' dead body ;' and that the word continued to be
used in that sense long after the days of Shakespeare, we have
a proof in the following lines ;
" What stranger who had seen thy shriv'led skin,
Thy thin, pale, gastly face, would not have been
K
130 SECOND PART OF KING HENRY VI.
Conceited he had seen a ghost i' th' bed,
New risen from the grave, not lately dead ?"
An Elegie on the death of Mr. Frear, &c., —
Hookes's Amanda, 1653, p. 207.
ACT IV.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 194.
" My gracious lord, retire to Kenilworth.
Therefore, away with us to Kenilworth"
All the old eds. have " Killingworth ;" and why alter a
form of the name so repeatedly found in contemporary
authors ?
" We'll enter in by darkness to Killingworth"
Marlowe's Edward the Second, act v. sc. 3.
SCENE 9.— C. p. 205 ; K. p. 96.
" Mess. Please it your grace to be advertised,
The duke of York is newly come from Ireland,
And with a puissant, and a mighty power
Of Gallowglasses, and stout Kernes,
Is marching hitherward in proud array ;
And still proclaimeth, as he comes along,
His arms are only to remove from thee
The duke of Somerset, whom he terms a traitor.
K. Hen. Thus stands my state, 'twixt Cade and York distress'd,
Like to a ship, that, having scap'd a tempest,
Is straightway calm, and boarded with a pirate."
The reading " arms " is not questioned by any of the editors.
In Observations, &c. appended to The First Sketches of the
Second and Third Parts of K. Henry the Sixth, p. 223, Mr.
Halliwell says, " The second folio reads ' armies/ a variation
not noticed by the editors, though apparently more congenial
to the context." Oh, no ! it is much worse than " arms," and,
besides, spoils the metre. There cannot be a shadow of doubt
that the true reading is " aims :" see my remarks on a passage
of Troilus and Cressida, act ii. sc. 3.
SECOND PART OF KING HENRY VI. 131
Mr. Collier gives "calm" without any comment. Malone
also prefers that nonsensical lection, and defends it in an
equally nonsensical note. In this passage the varies lectiones
of the old eds. (stated incorrectly in the Variorum Shake-
speare) are these : the first folio has " calme ;" the second folio
"claimd ;" the third folio " claim'd ;" the fourth folio "calm'd,"
— which is obviously the right reading, and has been adopted
by Mr. Knight.
ACT v.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 213.
" Som. O monstrous traitor ! — I arrest thee, York,
Of capital treason 'gainst the king and crown.
Obey, audacious traitor : kneel for grace.
York. Would'st have me kneel ? first let me ask of thee,
If they can brook I bow a knee to man ?
Sirrah, call in my sons to be my bail," &c.
" Thus all the old copies, and the sense seems to be, ' first let me
ask of thee, Somerset, if they (i. e. his sons, mentioned in the next
line) can brook that I should bow a knee to man ?' Theobald sub-
stituted these for ' thee,' and modern editors have followed him, some
with and some without notice that it was a variation from the
authentic text. To Mr. Amyot I owe the suggestion that no alter-
ation is required." COLLIER.
York would hardly put so strange a question to Somerset
as " let me ask of THEE, if my sons can brook that I should
kneel to man," — and one so altogether unnecessary, since he
immediately after orders them to be summoned. But the use
of " they" without an antecedent to which it can be referred,
" If they can brook I bow a knee to man," —
is alone sufficient to determine that there is some corruption in
the passage. Theobald, I apprehend, gave the right reading :
"these" is not improperly applied to the sons of York, who
are supposed to be within sight.
132
THIRD PART OF KING HENRY VI.
[Vol. v. COLLIER ; vol. vi. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 234; K. p. 180.
" K. Hen. I know not what to say : my title's weak.
Tell me, may not a king adopt an heir ?"
The first of these lines ought to be marked as spoken
aside.
ACT II.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 253.
" I, then in London, keeper of the king,
Muster'd my soldiers, gather'd flocks of friends,
March'd towards Saint Alban's to intercept the queen,
Bearing the king in my behalf along ;
For by my scouts I was advertised,
That she was coming with a full intent
To dash our late decree in parliament,
Touching king Henry's oath, and your succession."
"After this line
[' Muster'd my soldiers, gather'd flocks of friends'^,
modern editors have added another, from ' The True Tragedy :' —
' And very well appointed, as I thought,'
which is not at all necessar^ to the sense. If we were to adopt this
line into the text, we should have no excuse for not inserting many
more from the old 4to, not found in the folio, 1623, which we may
presume were rejected by Shakespeare, when he made his alterations
in, and additions to, ' The True Tragedy.' " COLLIER.
Mr. Collier is clearly right in not making a patch-work of
the text by inserting ad libitum from The True Tragedy pas-
sages which there is every reason to suppose were rejected by
Shakespeare : but I do not believe that the great poet intended
the line in question to be thrown out. The want of "and"
THIRD PART OF KING HENRY VI. 133
between " Mustered" and " March? d" (for the style of this play
is any thing but elliptical) goes far to prove that the line was
omitted in the folio by an error of the printer. In act ii. sc. 6,
p. 272, Mr. Collier inserts a line from The True Tragedy,
which he observes " is obviously necessary to the sense," and
adds, " how it became [sic] omitted in the folio, it is vain at
this time of day to conjecture." For several minor corrections
and additions (see pp. 231, 233, 238, 262, 284, 304,) he is
also indebted to the original drama.
ACT II.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 270 ; K. p. 214.
" Path. These arms of mine shall be thy winding-sheet;
My heart, sweet boy, shall be thy sepulchre,
For from my heart thine image ne'er shall go.
My sighing breast shall be thy funeral bell ;
And so obsequious will thy father be,
Man, for the loss of thee, having no more,
As Priam was for all his valiant sons."
" The folio, 1623, reads, by a misprint, 'Men for the loss of
thee/ The father is addressing his dead son. Rowe substituted
Sad." COLLIER.
Since we find in the fourth line above of the present
speech,
" My heart, sweet boy, shall be thy sepulchre,"
and in the preceding speeches of the Father,
" O boy! thy father gave thee life too soon,"
" Ah, boy! if any life be left in thee," —
it appears wonderful to me that Steevens should have proposed
(even timidly as he did) the reading which Mr. Collier has ad-
mitted into the text.
Both Malone and Mr. Knight are contented with Rowe's
" Sad," which is an emendation made at random, without any
regard to the ductus literarum. Surely " Men" must be a
misprint for " E'en."
134 THIRD PART OF KING HENRY VI.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 276.
" K. Hen. From Scotland am I stol'n, even of pure love,
To greet mine own land with my wishful sight.
No, Harry, Harry, 'tis no land of thine ;
Thy place is fill'd, thy sceptre wrung from thee,
Thy balm wash'd off wherewith thou wast anointed :
No bending knee will call thee Caesar now,
No humble suitors press to speak for right,
No, not a man comes for redress of thee,
For how can I help them, and not myself ?
Let me embrace the sour adversaries ,•
For wise men say, it is the wisest course."
" So the folio, and very intelligibly, without altering the text to
these sour adversities, as was done originally by Pope, and by some
modern editors without notice, though professing to adhere to the
text of the folio. Of old, 'adversary' was sometimes accented like
adversity, and thus the line is rendered more rhythmical." COLLIER.
The reading of the folio is flagrant nonsense. To say
nothing of the awkward use of" the," — since, from the earliest
times down to the present moment, the substantive " adver-
saries" has had no other meaning than opponents, and has
been applied only to PERSONS, it could not possibly be used
in reference to the adverse CIRCUMSTANCES which Henry has
just enumerated, — the loss of his throne, &c.
The reading of Pope, which has been adopted by all the
modern editors except Mr. Collier, is at least sense : but qy.
did not Shakespeare write,
" Let me embrace thee, sour adversitie (adversity)" ?
ACT IV.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 304.
" Now how to shroud yourself from enemies.'
Read "Nor."
135
KING RICHARD III.
[Vol. v. COLLIER ; vol. vi. KNIGHT.]
ACT II.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 401 ; K. p. 394.
" Insulting tyranny begins to jet
Upon the innocent and aweless throne."
" To 'jet' is to strut. The quartos all have 'jet,' and the folio
jut, which, no doubt, was meant for the same word." COLLIER.
" To jet upon" means here ' boldly to encroach upon.' In
this passage Mr. Knight (like Malone) gives,
" Insulting tyranny begins to jut," &c.
which is certainly wrong. But in the following passage of
Titus Andronicus, act ii. sc. 1, (where Malone, — though the
varice lectiones are only "jet" and "set," — chooses to print
"jut"!) Mr. Knight gives,
" and think you not how dangerous
It is to jet upon a prince's right ?"
Compare a passage in the play of Sir Thomas More (MS.
Harl. 7368, fol. 1) ; "It is hard when Englishmens pacience
must be thus jetted on by straungers."
ACT III.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 420 ; K. p. 413.
" And this is Edward's wife, that monstrous witch,
Consorted with that harlot, strumpet Shore,
That by their witchcraft thus have marked me."
Malone and Mr. Knight also give the above erroneous
punctuation. Here "harlot" is an adjective; and the line
should be pointed,
" Consorted with that harlot strumpet, Shore."
(so in the Comedy of Errors, act ii. sc. 2, " my harlot brow.")
136 KING RICHARD III.
Gloster in his next speech varies the epithet ;
" If! thou protector of this damned strumpet."
ACT IV.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 456.
" that call'd your grace
To breakfast once forth of my company."
" He [Malone] and other editors probably commit an error in
printing ' breakfast' as one word : the allusion is not to a particular
meal, but to breaking the fast or eating at any time." COLLIER.
In the first place, the rhythm requires the single word ; as
in Henry VIII. act iii. sc. 2 ;
" And, after, this ; and then to breakfast, with
What appetite you have."
Secondly, if a particular meal had not been alluded to, the
expression would have been " break your fast" (though that
form is frequently used when the morning meal is spoken of).
137
KING HENRY VIII.
[Vol. v. COLLIER; vol. vii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 502 ; K. p. 139.
" The two kings,
Equal in lustre, were now best, now worst,
As presence did present them ; him in eye,
Still him in praise ; and, being present both,
'Twas said, they saw but one : and no discerner
Durst wag his tongue in censure."
Mr. Knight explains "censure — comparison,"— a meaning
which the word never bore: it always signifies, 'judgment,
opinion.*
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 529; K. p. 170.
" There cannot be those numberless offences
'Gainst me, that I can not take peace with : no black envy
Shall make my grave. Commend me to his grace ;
And, if he speak of Buckingham, pray, tell him," &c.
Mr. Knight, adhering to the arrangement of the folios,
prints ;
" There cannot be those numberless offences
'Gainst me that I cannot take peace with :
No black envy shall make my grave.
Commend me to his grace ;
And if he speak of Buckingham, pray tell him," &c.
with the following note ;
" These short lines are not introduced without a meaning. With
those pauses in the delivery that properly belong to one speaking
under such circumstances, they add to the pathos. They are ordi-
narily printed after the uniform metrical fashion of the modern edi-
tors," &c.
Steevens, and those of his school, having formed their taste
on the plays of Howe, Home, &c., were altogether unable to
138 KING HENRY VIII.
relish the freer versification of Shakespeare ; and consequently,
whenever they encountered a line which did not accord exactly
with their notions of dramatic metre, they proceeded with-
out scruple to clip it or to lengthen it as the occasion might
require. In our own day (see the remarks of Mr. Collier and
Mr. Knight passim) the editors of Shakespeare run to the op-
posite extreme ; they have persuaded themselves that passages
which violate every rule of metre were purposely left in that
state by the great poet, for the sake of producing some parti-
cular effect on the audience, or the reader.
That in their blank verse Shakespeare and his contempo-
raries frequently interposed an imperfect line (sometimes a very
short one), is not to be doubted ; but that they ever introduced
two, much less three, consecutively, not all the arguments of
the most subtle-minded critic would induce me to believe.
There is, indeed, some ground for supposing that not a few
of the passages in our early dramas, where a single imperfect
line occurs, and where the context does not indicate any omis-
sion, may have been mutilated by transcribers or printers.
In the following beautiful speech, whatever arrangement be
adopted, an imperfect line will still remain ;
" Right royal sir, I should
Sing you an epithalamium of these lovers,
But having lost my best airs with my fortunes,
And wanting a celestial harp to strike
This blessed union on, thus in glad story
I give you all. These two fair cedar-branches,
The noblest of the mountain where they grew,
Straightest and tallest, under whose still shades
The worthier beasts have made their lairs, and slept
Free from the Sirian star and the fell thunder-stroke,
Free from the clouds,
When they were big with humour, and deliver'd
In thousand spouts their issues to the earth ;
Oh, there was none but silent quiet there !
Till never-pleased Fortune shot up shrubs,
Base under-brambles, to divorce these branches," &c.
Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster, act v. sc. 3.
As the continuity of the sense is unbroken, no one perhaps
would have suspected that the text of this speech is not entire.
KING HENRY VIII. 139
Such, however, is the case ; for the first edition of Philaster
(which the editors of Beaumont and Fletcher had not consulted)
does away with the imperfect line by reading as follows, and,
doubtless, as the author wrote ;
" Free from the fervour of the Sirian star
And the fell thunder-stroke, free from the clouds,
When they were big," &c.
SCENE 3 — C. p. 538 ; K. p. 178.
" O ! now, after
So many courses of the sun enthron'd,
Still growing in a majesty and pomp, the which
To leave, a thousand-fold more bitter, than
'Tis sweet at first t' acquire, — after this process," &c.
The passage may be much better arranged as follows ;
" O ! now after
So many courses of the sun enthron'd,
Still growing in a majesty and pomp,
The which to leave a thousand-fold more bitter,
Than 'tis sweet at first t' acquire, — after this process," &c.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 563.
" my endeavours
Have ever come too short of my desires,
Yet fill' d with my abilities."
On this passage Mr. Collier has no note, having blindly
adopted the reading of the folios ; which is so obviously wrong,
that when the other modern editors corrected it to " fil'd,"
they did not even mention the original misprint. Richardson
in his excellent Dictionary cites the present passage as the first
example of the verb file.
The misprint of "filVd" for " fil'd" is a common one.
Where the first quarto of Beaumont and Fletcher's Wit without
Money has rightly,
" Who taught you manners and apt carriage,
To rank yourselves ? who fil'd you in fit taverns ? "
(Act iii. sc. 4.)
the second quarto and the folio have " filled."
140 KING HENRY VIII.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 573.
" Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's,
Thy God's, and truth's : then, if thou fall'st, O Cromwell!
Thou fall'st a blessed martyr.
Serve the king ; and, — Pr'ythee, lead me in :
There take an inventory of all I have," &c.
This regulation of the metre is very objectionable, because
it occasions such a pause in the concluding portion of Wolsey's
advice to Cromwell. The arrangement of the other modern
editors is much to be preferred ;
" Thou fall'st a blessed martyr. Serve the king;
And, — Pr'ythee, lead me in :
There take an inventory of all I have," &c.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 578.
" 3 Gent. Thomas Cromwell ;
A man in much esteem with the king, and truly
A worthy friend. — The king has made him
Master o' the jewel-house,
And one, already, of the privy- council."
Here again Mr. Collier's arrangement is faulty, because it
leaves, — what I am convinced could never have been intended
by Shakespeare, — two imperfect lines together (see my remarks
p. 138). The other modern editors regulate the passage better;
" A worthy friend. — The king
Has made him master of the jewel-house,
And one, already, of the privy- council."
ACT v.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 586 ; K. p. 232.
" A Gallery in the Palace.
Enter GARDINER, Bishop of Winchester, a Page with a Torch before
him ; met by Sir THOMAS LOVELL.
Gar. It's one o'clock, boy, is't not ?
Boy. It hath struck.
Gar. These should be hours for necessities,
KING HENRY Vril. 141
Not for delights ; times to repair our nature
With comforting repose, and not for us
To waste these times. — Good hour of night, sir Thomas :
Whither so late ?
Lov. Came you from the king, my lord ?"
I think it very injudicious to retain here, as Mr. Collier
and the other modern editors do, the stage-direction of the
folios, because it can hardly fail to mislead those readers who
may not be aware that in early editions of plays the entrances
are often, as in the present instance, prematurely marked (a
peculiarity on which I shall have more to say in a note on
Troilus and Cressida, act i. sc. 2). Sir Thomas Lovell cer-
tainly does not enter till after the words " To waste these
times."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 599 ; K. p. 243.
" K. Hen. You were ever good at sudden commendations,
Bishop of Winchester ; but know, I come not
To hear such flattery now, and in my presence :
They are too thin and base to hide offences.
To me you cannot reach. You play the spaniel,
And think with wagging of your tongue to win me ;
But, whatsoe'er thou tak'st me for, I'm sure,
Thou hast a cruel nature, and a bloody. —
Good man, [To CRANMER.] sit down. Now, let me see the proudest,
He that dares most, but wag his finger at thee :
By all that's holy, he had better starve,
Than but once think his place becomes thee not."
I believe that the passage ought to stand thus ;
" K. Hen. You were ever good at sudden commendations,
Bishop of Winchester ; but know, I come not
To hear such flattery now ; and in my presence
They are too thin and bare to hide offences.
To me, you cannot reach, you play the spaniel,
And think with wagging," &c.
(Malone saw that " bare" was the right lection, though he
retained " base.")
But in the last line of this speech what is- the meaning of
"his" — a reading which Malone and Mr. Knight also give?
KING HENRY VIII.
The latter editor (like Mr. Collier) does not inform us. Malone
has the following explanation ;
"Who dares to suppose that the place or situation in which he
is, is not suitable to thee also ? who supposes that thou art not as fit
for the office of a privy- counsellor as he is ? — Mr. Rowe and all the
subsequent editors read — ' this place/ "
Assuredly, Rowe did well in making the alteration : " this
place" is the place which Cranmer has just taken at the king's
command — "Good man, sit down." The misprint of "his"
for " this" is one of the commonest : in a play by Beaumont
and Fletcher, which I am now preparing for the press, it twice
occurs ;
" A dainty wench !
Would I might farm his [read this] custom !"
The Custom of the Country, act i. sc. 1.
" there I am wretched,
That I have not two lives lent me for his [read this'] sacrifice,
One for her son, another for her sorrows."
Act v. sc. 5.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 604 ; K. p. 247.
" These are the youths that thunder at a play-house, and fight
for bitten apples ; that no audience, but the Tribulation of Tower-
hill, or the limbs of Limehouse, their dear brothers, are able to
endure."
" Johnson supposed that ' the Tribulation' of Tower-hill was some
fanatical meeting-house. Possibly, for ' limbs of Limehouse/ we
ought to read * lambs of Limehouse ;' as the 'lambs of Nottingham'
still mean the riotous and violent mob of that town. However,
' limbs of Limehouse' is a very intelligible expression, referring to
the species of population in that vicinity." COLLIER.
Steevens was the first who proposed the unnecessary con-
jecture, " lambs of Limehouse ;" and when Mr. Collier pro-
ceeded to illustrate it by observing that " the ' lambs of Not-
tingham' still mean the riotous and violent mob of that town,"
he must have forgotten, for the moment, what the text de-
clares concerning the personages at Limehouse, viz. that they
were remarkable for patient endurance.
Mr. Knight's explanation is indeed a subtle one : "Is
KING HENRY VIII. 143
it not," says he, " that the puritans, hating playhouses, ap-
proved of the uproar of those who 'fight for bitten apples,'
because it disturbed those that came to hear ?" (Illustrations
of Act v.)
I cannot resist noticing one portion of the immense mass of
rubbish which the commentators (see the Varior. Shakespeare)
have piled up here. " Dr. Johnson's conjecture," observes
Steevens, " may be countenanced by the following passage
in ' Magnificence, a goodly Interlude and a mery, devised and
made by Mayster Skelton, Poete Laureate, lately deceasyd.'
Printed by John Rastell, fol. no date :
' Some fall to foly them selfe for to spyll,
And some fall prechynge on toure hyll [read, at the toure hyU] .' "
Here, as he sometimes did elsewhere, Steevens quoted what
he did not understand : he evidently supposed that " some
fall prechynge at the toure hyll" meant that ' some set up
for preachers on Tower-hill,' while it really means that ' some
finish their course by being executed on Tower-hill, where,
in their last moments, they make an exhortation to the re-
probate.5
In this fling at the affected meekness of the Puritans,
Shakespeare, I apprehend, merely intended to say, that ' no
audience, unless it consisted of downright saints, could possibly
tolerate the noisy youths in question.' " The Tribulation of
Tower-hill" evidently means some particular set or meeting
of Puritans, — (one of the characters in Jonson's Alchemist is
named " Tribulation- Wholesome, a pastor of Amsterdam"), —
and " the Limbs of Limehouse, their dear brothers," another
set.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 605 ; K. p. 247.
" I'll peck you o'er the pales else."
" Malone understands ' peck' &sj3ickorj)itch; but the word has
a very intelligible meaning without alteration." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight prints " pick."
The following passage of an almost unreadable poem may
be cited here ;
144 KING HENRY VIII.
" Can such finde patrones, such course to protect ?
They can and doe, but would they might be barr'd
From Barres, or that ore Barres they might be peckt,
Els at Barres with as hard a doome be checkt."
Davies's Microcosmos, 1611, p. 209.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 606.
" The Troop pass once about the stage, and
Garter speaks.
Gart. Heaven,
From thy endless goodness, send prosperous life,
Long, and ever happy, to the high and mighty
Princess of England, Elizabeth !"
So the speech of Garter (which is borrowed almost ver-
batim from Hall's Chronicle) is divided in the folios, and, no
doubt, when it first meets the eye, may be mistaken for verse ;
but that any one, after having read it, should fail to discover
that it is pure prose, appears next to incredible.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 607 ; K. p. 249.
" Sheba was never
More covetous of wisdom, and fair virtue,
Than this pure soul shall be."
Here Mr. Collier and the other modern editors, with the
exception of Mr. Knight, alter the "Saba" of the old eds. to
"Sheba" — and most improperly, lor tHe former name is that
which our early writers usually give to the guest of Solomon.
Compare Marlowe ;
" Were she as chaste as was Penelope,
As wise as Saba, or as beautiful
As was bright Lucifer before his fall."
Doctor Faustus, act ii. sc. 1.
and Peele ;
" Diana for her dainty life, Susanna being sad,
Sage Saba for her soberness."
Sir Clyomon and Sir Clamydes, — Peele's Works,
iii. 129, ed. Dyce.
KING HENRY VTII. 145
and William Gager in a copy of Latin verses addressed to
Queen Elizabeth (hitherto, I believe, imprinted) ;
" En Juno sceptrum tibi prsebet, et segida Pallas ;
Arcum submittit casta Diana suum ;
Phrixeo Colchis te donat vellere ; pomum
Quod Paris huic dederat dat tibi pulchra Venus ;
Deservit Cassandra tibi ; te Saba salutat ;
Officium praestat virgo Atalanta suum ;
Undique muneribus certant studiisque placere,
Felices quarum munera, diva, probas."
SCENE 4. — C. p. 608 ; K. p. 250.
" Cran. She shall be, to the happiness of England,
An aged princess ; many days shall see her,
And yet no day without a deed to crown it.
Would I had known no more ! but she must die :
She must ; the saints must have her : yet a virgin,
A most unspotted lily shall she pass
To the ground, and all the world shall mourn her."
The above punctuation makes Cranmer regret his super-
natural foreknowledge of Elizabeth's being destined to pay the
common debt of humanity. The passage should be pointed
thus;
" Would I had known no more ! but she must die
(She must, the saints must have her) yet a virgin ;
A most unspotted lily shall she pass
To the ground, and all the world shall mourn her."
146
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.
[Vol. vi. COLLIER ; vol. ix. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 17.
" And, like as there were husbandry in war,
Before the sun rose, he was harness'd light,
And to the field goes he."
" Some corruption may be suspected here ; for first the connec-
tion and meaning are not very intelligible, and next the word ' light'
in the folio and quartos is spelt lyte ; an unusual orthography, ' light'
being then generally printed as at present. Lite or lyte formerly
meant little, and it is so used by Chaucer and our elder poets. The
common explanation of the passage has been, that Hector was lightly
armed." COLLIER.
I see no necessity for quarrelling with the reading, " light:"
it is evidently used adverbially for lightly; and perhaps it may
be employed here in a sense which the adverb frequently
bears in the works of our earliest writers, viz. ' quickly, soon :'
" Lightly or sone." Prompt. Parv. ed. 1499. If "lyte" be
an error of the press, qy. is it a misprint for tyte — tight, i. e.
tightly ? In Antony and Cleopatra, while Cleopatra and Eros
are helping Antony to put on his armour, he exclaims,
" Thou fumblest, Eros ; and my queen's a squire
More tight at this than thou."
Act iv. sc. 4.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 24 ; K. p. 301.
" Cres. Be those with swords?
PARIS passes over.
Pan. Swords ? any thing, he cares not ; an the devil come to him,
it's all one: by god's lid, it does one's heart good. — Yonder comes
Paris," &c.
So, indeed, the entrance of Paris is marked in the old eds.,
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 147
but merely for the sake of warning the actor to be in readiness
to enter : he was certainly not intended to walk over the stage
before Pandarus had spoken of him.
In other plays of Shakespeare the modern editors, includ-
ing Mr. Collier, retain the absurdly -premature "Enter" of
the prompter's book. For instance, in Romeo and Juliet;
" Gre. 'Tis well, thou art not fish ; if thou hadst, thou hadst
been poor John . Draw thy tool ; here comes two of the house of
the Montagues.
Enter ABRAM and BALTHASAR.
Sam. My naked weapon is out : quarrel, I will back thee.
Gre. How ! turn thy back, and run ?
Sam. Fear me not.
Gre. No, marry : I fear thee !
Sam. Let us take the law of our sides ; let them begin.
Gre. I will frown as I pass by, and let them take it as they list.
Sam. Nay, as they dare. I will bite my thumb at them ; which
is a disgrace to them, if they bear it.
Abr. Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?"
Act i. sc. 1, vol. vi. 375.
(Abram and Balthasar should enter after the last speech of
Sampson.)
In a note on a later passage of the play just cited, Mr.
Collier observes, " The entrance of Romeo is marked in the
old copies eight lines before he speaks : perhaps he was in-
tended to stand back for a time, in order not to interrupt the
friar's reflections," p. 415. The fact is, Romeo's entrance was
marked " eight lines before he speaks" merely to shew that,
towards the end of the Friar's soliloquy, the actor who played
Romeo was to prepare himself (or be ^summoned) to enter, —
not, that he was to come on the stage before the conclusion of
the Friar's speech.
Again, in Macbeth;
*' Enter ROSSE.
Macd. See, who comes here ?
Mai. My countryman ; but yet I know him not.
Macd. My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither.
Mai. I know him now."
Act iv. sc. 3, vol. vii. 167.
(The speech of Malcom, " My countryman ; but yet I know
148 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.
him not," means, — ' My countryman by his dress, but yet, at
this distance, I know him not, cannot distinguish his features ;'
and is, of course, spoken before the entrance of Rosse.)
Again, in Othello ;
" Enter OTHELLO.
Look, where he comes ! Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou ow'dst yesterday.
Oth. Ha ! ha ! false to me ? to me ?"
Act iii. sc. 3, vol. vii. 57 1 .
(Mr. Knight is the only editor who has rightly placed the
entrance of Othello after " Which thou ow'dst yesterday.")
And in the same play ;
" here he comes. —
Re-enter CASSIO.
As he shall smile, Othello shall go mad ;
And his unbookish jealousy must construe
Poor Cassio's smiles, gestures, and light behaviour,
Quite in the wrong. — How do you now, lieutenant ?"
Act iv. sc. 1, p. 589.
(The proper arrangement is, of course,
" Quite in the wrong.
Re-enter CASSIO.
How do you now, lieutenant ?")
It may be worth adding, that in old dramas we frequently
find, not only the entrances marked much too soon, but also
stage-directions, concerning things which may be required for
the scene, set down 18ng before tlie said articles are to be
used : so in Beaumont and Fletcher's Little French Lawyer,
(act iii. sc. 4, of my ed.), according to the first folio ;
" Din. Why doe you speake so lowd ? I pray'e goe in.
Sweet Mistris I am mad, time steales away,
And when we would enjoy —
Lam. Now fy, fy servant, Wine.
Like sensuall beasts, shall we enjoy our pleasures ?
Din. Pray doe but kisse me then.
Lam. Why, that I will, and you shall find anon, servant —
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 149
Din. Softly for heavens sake, you know my friend's engag'd,
A little now, now ; Will you goe in againe ?
Lam. Ha, ha, ha, ha.
Din. Why doe you laugh so lowd ? pretious,
Will you betray me ? ha my friends throat cut ?
Lam. Come, come, Tie kisse thee again.
Cham. Will you so ? you are liberall,
If you doe cozen me —
Enter Nurse with Wine.
Din. What's this?
Lam. Wine, wine, a draught or two." p. 64.
(The stage-direction " Wine" opposite the first speech of La-
mira, was intended to warn the property-man to have wine in
readiness against the entrance of the Nurse.)
SCENE 2. — C. p. 26 ; K. p. 303.
" Pan. I'll be with you, niece, by and by.
Cres. To bring, uncle, —
Pan. Ay, a token from Troilus."
The modern editors appear not to have understood this
passage : they have no notes on it ; and, in opposition to the old
copies, erroneously put a break, as Mr. Collier does, at the
end of Cressida's speech, supposing it to be incomplete.
When Pandarus says, " I'll be with you, niece, by and by,"
Cressida catches at the words " Til be with you" and subjoins
" to bring" — just as Pandarus catches at " to bring" and adds,
" Ay, a token," &c.
The expression, to be with a person to bring, is one of which
I can more easily adduce examples than explain the exact
meaning : its import, however, may be gathered from the fol-
lowing passages ;
" And I'll close with Bryan till I have gotten the thing
That he hath promis'd me, and then I'll be with him to bring :
Well, such shifting knaves as I am, the ambodexter must play,
And for commodity serve every man, whatsoever the world say."
Sir Clyomon and Sir Clamydes, — Peele's Works,
iii. 44, ed. Dyce.
" And here I'll have a fling at him, that's flat ;
150 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.
And, Balthazar, /'// be with thee to bring,
And thee, Lorenzo," £c.
Kyd's Spanish Tragedy, act iv. — Dodsley's Old
Plays, iii. 163, last ed.
" E. Love. I would have watch'd you, sir, by your good patience,
For ferreting in my ground.
Lady. You have been with my sister ?
Wei. Yes, to bring.
E. Love. An heir into the world, he means."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady, act v. sc. 4.
(The modern editors of B. and F., like those of Shakespeare,
erroneously deviate from the old eds. in placing a break after
" to bring:')
SCENE 3.— C. p. 29 ; K. p. 306.
" and such again,
As venerable Nestor, hatch 'd in silver," &c.
On this passage, where a note is positively required, neither
Mr. Collier nor Mr. Knight says a single word. See the pre-
sent work, pp. 76, 77.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 30.
" When that the general is not like the hive,
To whom the foragers shall all repair,
What honey is expected ?"
" ' The meaning,' says Johnson, ' is, — When the general is not to
the army like the hive to the bees, the repository of the stock of every
individual, that to which each particular resorts with whatever he has
collected for the good of the whole, what honey is expected? what
hope of advantage ?' Johnson's explanation may possibly be doubted,
and in this passage, as in others, in ' Measure for Measure/ Vol. ii.
p. 42, and in ' Hamlet/ A. ii. sc. 2, ' 'Twas caviare to the general/
the word ' general' might be taken for the general body of the people.
Ulysses may mean to ask, what advantage can be expected when the
subjects of a king are not like bees, which, after foraging among
flowers, all repair to the hive with their honey." COLLIER.
How could Mr. Collier hazard an interpretation so utterly
at variance with the following passage, towards the end of the
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 151
same speech, — a passage, too, which proves that Johnson has
rightly explained the earlier one ?
" The general's disdain'd
By him one step below ; he, by the next ;
That next, by him beneath," &c.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 36.
" He hath a lady, wiser, fairer, truer,
Than ever Greek did couple in his arms.'
" The folio, ' did compass,' &c." COLLIER.
The reading of the 4tos, now brought back into the text,
is neither English nor sense.
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 42; K. p. 320.
" Ther. Nay, look upon him.
Achil. So I do : what's the matter ?
Ther. Nay, but regard him well.
Achil. Well, why I do so."
So all the modern editors. But the last of these speeches
ought to stand thus ;
" Well! why, I do so."
Achilles echoes the " well" of Thersites. It is impossible that
"well" when followed by "why" can be a term of admission.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 44.
" Ther. There's Ulysses, and old Nestor, — whose wit was
mouldy ere your grandsires had nails on their toes, — yoke you like
draught oxen, and make you plough up the war.
Achil. What ? what ?
Ther. Yes, good sooth : to, Achilles, to Ajax, to —
Ajax. I shall cut out your tongue."
The punctuation of the words which I have marked in
Italics is so extravagantly wrong, that even the most acute
reader, if previously unacquainted with the passage, would
152 TR01LUS AND CRESSIDA.
find some difficulty in attaching to them anything like a
meaning. The proper pointing is,
" to, Achilles ! to, Ajax ! to !"
Thersites is urging the supposed oxen to their tasks.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 47 ; K. p. 325.
" He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and freshness
Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes pale the morning."
" The folio reads, ' makes stale the morning/ which cannot be
right." COLLIER.
Though Mr. Collier declares that " stale " cannot be
right, I think that Mr. Knight has done well in adopting it :
" stale" is more properly opposed to " freshness" than " pale ;"
and compare the following lines of Lyly's Maydes Metamor-
phosis, 1600;
" Amidst the mountaine Ida groues,
Where Paris kept his Heard,
Before the other Ladies all,
He would haue thee preferd :
Pallas for all her painting than,
Her face would seeme but pale ;
Then Juno would have blusht for shame,
And Venus looked stale." Sig. D 2.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 52 ; K. p. 329.
" O, thou great thunder- darter of Olympus ! forget that thou art
Jove the king of gods; and, Mercury, lose all the serpentine craft
of thy Caduceus, if ye take not that little, little, less-than-little wit
from them that they have ; which short-armed ignorance itself knows
is so abundant scarce, it will not in circumvention deliver a fly
from a spider, without drawing their massy irons and cutting the
web."
This passage contains an obvious misprint, which, however,
none of the editors have noticed : the right reading is undoubt-
edly " short-aimed" ignorance, — i. e. ignorance whose aim is
short. In Coriolanus we find,
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 153
" By the discovery,
We shall be shorten d in our aim"
Act i. sc. 2.
In the present play, act v. sc. 7, p. 131, Mr. Collier rightly
prints,
" In fellest manner execute your aims."
on which reading he observes ;
" So the quarto belonging to the Duke of Devonshire, and not
arms, as it stands in the other quarto, nor arm, as it is given in the
folio."
In Hamlet, act iv. sc. 7, vol. vii. 314, are these lines;
" so that my arrows,
Too slightly timber' d for so loud a wind,
Would have reverted to my bow again,
And not where I had aimd them," —
on which Mr. Collier observes ;
" The quartos, 1604, &c. are right in giving ' aim'd' instead of
' arm'd,' as it is misprinted in the folio."
There can be 110 doubt that in the following passage of the
Second Part of King Henry VI. act iv. sc. 9, vol. v. 205, the
word "arms" (which none of the modern editors have ques-
tioned) ought to be " aims ;"
" And still proclaimeth, as he comes along,
His arms are only to remove from thee
The duke of Somerset, whom he terms a traitor."
SCENE 3.— C. p. 54.
" Here is such patchery, such juggling, and such knavery !"
" Meaning folly. Fools were often of old called patches, on ac-
count of their dress." COLLIER.
No, no. " Patchery " means something quite opposed to
folly, viz. *a patching up to deceive, — roguery.' The word
occurs again in a passage of Timon of Athens (on which Mr.
Collier has no note) ;
" Ay, and you hear him cog, see him dissemble,
Know his gross patchery, love him, feed him,
154 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.
Keep in your bosom ; yet remain assur'd,
That he's a made-up villain."
Act v. sc. i. vol. vi. 580.
" Agam. Let it be known to him that we are here,
We sent our messengers ; and we lay by
Our appertainments visiting of him," &c.
" The quartos read, ' He sate,' and the folio, ' He sent.' The
ordinary reading since the time of Theobald has been, ' He shent,'
or rebuked our messengers ; but, as Mr. Barren Field observes to
me, Achilles had not rebuked any messengers, and the mistake is
not in the word sent, as it stands in the folio, but in the word He,
which was a mere transcriber's error for * We.' " COLLIER.
" We sent our messengers" — a simple declaration that
Agamemnon had sent messengers to Achilles, without any
mention of the treatment which those messengers had re-
ceived from the latter, — by no means suits with what imme-
diately follows in the sentence. Theobald's correction may
not be the genuine reading ; but it appears to me greatly pre-
ferable to that now adopted. The objection brought against
it in Mr. Collier's note, viz. that " Achilles had not rebuked
any messengers" (meaning, I presume, that the said rebuking
is not previously mentioned in the play), forms really no ob-
jection at all ; for neither is there previously the slightest hint
of messengers having been sent by Agamemnon to Achilles ;
yet from the present passage (whichever reading be adopted)
it is clear that they had been sent ; and as we are expressly
told (act i. sc. 3) that Achilles used to take pleasure in
seeing Patroclus " pageant" Agamemnon, we surely may sup-
pose that he would treat his messengers with any thing but
respect.
Besides, the word shent is frequently employed by Shake-
speare.
SCENE 3.—C. p. 59.
" No, this thrice-worthy and right valiant lord
Must not so stale his palm, nobly acquir'd ;
Nor, by my will, assubjugate his merit,
As amply titled as Achilles is, by going to Achilles:
That were to enlard his fat-already pride," &c.
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 155
Here Mr. Collier follows the old eds., where a line and a
hemistich happen to be run together by a mistake of the ori-
ginal compositor. The usual modern arrangement,
" As amply titled as Achilles is,
By going to Achilles :
That were to enlard his fat-already pride," &c.
is doubtless preferable to a line of seventeen syllables.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 65.
" These lovers cry — Oh ! oh ! they die !
Yet that which seems the wound to kill,
Doth turn oh ! oh ! to ha ! ha ! he f
So dying love lives still :
Oh f oh f a while, but ha f ha ! ha !
Oh ! oh ! groans out for ha ! ha ! ha ! — hey ho .'"
Mr. Collier's adherence to the old eds, in this instance
is perfectly unaccountable, because it necessarily destroys the
rhyme. " Hey ho," which the original compositor had by
mistake put into Italic type and made the concluding word of
the song, is an exclamation of Pandarus after he has finished
his ditty.
In Hamlet, act iv. sc. 5 (vol. vii. 310), Ophelia, after sing-
ing three lines of a song, says, " Fare you well, my dove ;" on
which Mr. Collier remarks, " In the folio, these words are
erroneously printed in Italics, as if part of the song." Yes ;
and the very same error has taken place in the present passage
of Troilus and Cressida.
ACT IV.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 102 ; K. p. 375.
" Nor dignifies an impair thought with breath."
Mr. Knight also prints " impair" — and without any com-
ment ! ! Mr. Collier has the following note ;
"A thought unworthy of him, not equal to him. It is printed
impure in the quarto impressions, and hence the Rev. H. Barry sug-
156 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.
gests that the true reading may have been impure, but we adhere to
the ancient authorities. Chapman uses " impair" in his ' Shield of
Achilles,' 1598 ; and in the folio the word is spelt impaire." COLLIER.
In the first place, long before the Rev. H. Barry was born,
Johnson had observed, " This word [' impair'] I should have
changed to impure, were I not overpowered by the unanimity
of the editors and the concurrence of the old copies." Se-
condly, the passage in Chapman's Achilles' Shield, — which
was first pointed out by Steevens, and which I now subjoin
entire, — is nothing to the purpose, for in it " empaire" is a
SUBSTANTIVE :
" To the vnderstander.
" You are not euery bodie, to you (as to one of my very few
friends) I may be bold to vtter my minde, nor is it more empaire
[i. e. impair, impairment] to an honest and absolute mans sufficiencie
to haue few friendes, then to an Homericall Poeme to have few corn-
menders, for neyther doe common dispositions keepe fitte or plausible
consort with iudiciall and simple honestie, nor are idle capacities
comprehensible of an elaborate Poeme."
Steevens's unfortunate illustration, " So in Chapman's pre-
face," &c. has misled not only the other editors of Shakespeare,
but also Nares, Todd, and Richardson, who, in their respective
works, assert that Chapman uses impair as an adjective ! !
The right reading in the passage of our text is, of course,
" Nor dignifies an impure thought with breath."
Impure (like complete and several other words) was often
accented on the first syllable by our early writers ;
*' For shame and modesty I name them not ;
But let their black soules beare the impure blot
Of falshood, penury," &c.
The Praise of Hemp -seed, p. 81, — Taylor's
Workes, ed, 1630.
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 157
ACT V.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 1 14 ; K. p. 387.
" You flow to great distraction."
" Some misprint may be suspected in the word ' flow.' " COLLIER.
So far from perceiving any reason to suspect a misprint, I
think the expression very striking and poetical.
Messrs. Malone and Knight give, with the 4tos, " destruc-
tion"— a mere misprint, as the other speeches of Ulysses
might have shewed them ;
" You are mov'd, prince : let us depart, I pray you,
Lest your displeasure should enlarge itself
To wrathful terms."
" You have not patience ; come."
" You will break out."
" Possibly," says M. Mason, " we ought to read destruc-
tion, as Ulysses has told Troilus just before,
' this place is dangerous ;
The time right deadly.' "
But what is the meaning of "GREAT destruction"? Malone
explains it (foolishly enough) " imminent danger;'' and Steevens
(ten times more foolishly) " noble death from the hand of Dio-
medes " !
SCENE 11.— C. p. 134.
" Frown on, you heavens, effect your rage with speed !
Sit, gods, upon your thrones, and smile at Troy !"
" So the old copies, quarto and folio. Sir T. Hanmer read
' smite at Troy/ with some plausibility ; but we adhere to the old
text, taking ' smile at Troy,' as meaning 'smile' in derision. COL-
LIER.
The main objection to " smile," as Mason observes, is
" frown" in the preceding line. But compare a passage of
Beaumont and Fletcher ;
" weak tears,
And troubled hearts, the dull twins of cold spirits,
They [the gods'] sit and smile at."
Bonduca, act iii. sc. 1,
158
CORIOLANUS.
[Vol. vi. COLLIER; vol. ii. Tragedies, Pict. ed. K.*]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 144 ; K. p. 152.
" I shall tell you
A pretty tale : it may be, you have heard it ;
But, since it serves my purpose, I will venture
To scale 't a little more."
" To ' scale' is to disperse, as many instances might be brought
to prove. The word is still used in our northern counties, with refer-
ence to the scattering of seed, or the spreading of manure. See Hol-
loway's General Provincial Dictionary, 8vo. 1838." COLLIER.
So too Malone (understanding " scale" in the sense of ' dis-
perse') ; and so Mr. Knight, whose explanation is as follows ;
" Menenius will venture to weigh, to try the value, of the ' pretty
tale' a little more ; though they may have heard it, he will again
scale it" ! ! !
All this blundering is really piteous. The genuine read-
ing was long ago restored by Theobald, though it is not even
mentioned by Messrs. Collier and Knight.
On the passage of Massinger's Unnatural Combat, act iv.
sc. 2,
"I'll not stale the jest
By my relation,"
Gifford has the following note ;
" t . e. render it flat, deprive it of zest by previous intimation. This
is one of a thousand instances which might be brought to prove that
the true reading in Coriolanus, act i. sc. 1, is,
' To stale 't a little more/
The old copies have scale, for which Theobald judiciously proposed
stale. To this Warburton objects petulantly enough, it must be con-
• The volume of Mr. Knight's Library edition which contains this play has
not yet appeared.
CORIOLANUS. 159
fessed, because to scale signifies to weigh ; so, indeed, it does, and
many other things ; none of which, however, bear any relation to the
text. Steevens, too, prefers scale, which he proves, from a variety of
authorities, to mean ' scatter, disperse, spread : ' to make any of them,
however, suit his purpose, he is obliged to give an unfaithful ver-
sion of the text ; ' Though some of you have heard the story, I will
spread it yet wider, and diffuse it among the rest.' There is nothing
of this in Shakespeare ; and indeed I cannot avoid looking upon the
whole of his long note as a feeble attempt to justify a palpable error
of the press at the cost of taste and sense." Massinger's Works, i.
204, ed. 1813.
There is indeed no end of passages in our early dramatists
where stale occurs in the sense of f make stale, familiar,' &c. :
see Julius Casar, act i. sc. 3, and my remarks there ; com-
pare too ;
" This is not to be staled by my report."
Massinger's Bashful Lover, act iv. sc. 3.
"I'll not stale them
By giving up their characters ; but leave you
To make your own discoveries."
Fletcher's Queen of Corinth, act i. sc. 3.
" What, stale my invention beforehand?"
Fletcher and Rowley's Maid in the Mill, act iv. sc. 1.
where both the old copies have the same misprint which the
folios give in the present passage of Coriolanus, — "scale."
" it tauntingly replied
T" the discontented members," &c.
Is it possible to pronounce such a contraction as "2" the"
Mr. Co llier gives it again, in Antony and Cleopatra ;
" Unstate his happiness, and be stag'd f the show
Against a sworder." Act iii. sc. 11, vol. viii. 81
SCENE 3.— C. p. 154.
" the breasts of Hecuba,
When she did suckle Hector, look'd not lovelier
Than Hector's forehead, when it spit forth blood
At Grecian sword's contending."
160 CORIOLANUS.
" The folio misprints ' contending' contenning, which the second
folio alters to contending, and prints sword ' swords.' We feel bound
to follow this authority, as next in authenticity ; but ' contemning' —
Hector's forehead contemning at the Grecian sword — seems, possibly,
the word which was written by Shakespeare, and misread by the old
compositor." COLLIER.
Read " swords" (not " sword's" nor " swords' ").
SCENE 6.— C. p. 161 ; K. p. 159.
" the Roman gods
Lead their successes as we wish our own,
That both our powers, with smiling fronts encountering,
May give you thankful sacrifice !"
The word " you" in the last line shews that " the Roman
gods" is wrong. Read " ye Roman, gods :" the original com-
positor mistook " ye" for " ye" (the).
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 174.
" Good den to your worships : more of your conversation would
infect my brain, being the herdsman of the beastly plebeians."
Read, with all other eds., early and modern, and as the
sense requires, " herdsmen."
SCENE 1.— C. p. 176 ; K. p. 170.
" Vol. These are the ushers of Marcius : before him
He carries noise, and behind him he leaves tears.
Death, that dark spirit, in's nervy arm doth lie ;
Which, being advanc'd, declines, and then men die."
The first period of this speech is (like all the preceding
speeches of Volumnia in the present scene) prose ; and as such
Mr. Knight gives it.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 178.
" the kitchen malkin £)ins
Her richest lockram 'bout her reechy neck," &c.
CORIOLANUS. 161
" ' Malkin,' observes Ritson, is properly the diminutive of Mai
(Mary) ; as Wilkin, Tomkin, &c. In Scotland, pronounced Maukin,
it signifies a hare. Grey malkin (corruptly grimalkin) is a cat. The
kitchen malkin is the same as the scullion. In Holloway's ' Provin-
cial Dictionary/ 8vo, 1838, we are informed that Malkin or Mawkin,
in Norfolk and Suffolk, signifies ' a scarecrow,' and that it is also
applied to ' a dirty ragged blouzy wench.' Mr. Amyot confirms these
explanations to me." COLLIER.
Malkin , applied to a woman, is of very frequent occurrence
in our early writers ; and surely, on the present occasion, there
was no necessity for any other explanation than that the word
is supposed to be the diminutive of Mai (Mary), and that
" the kitchen malkin" is equivalent to ' the kitchen wench' (as
" the country malkin' means ' the country wench,' &c.). — What
have we to do here with its signifying " a hare," " a cat," and
" a scarecrow," (or, as it also does, " a mop") ?
The above note bears a strong resemblance to one of the
illustrative remarks in a book which Dr. Dibdin, with his
usual discrimination, calls "a valuable production," — the Va-
riorum Statins ;
" Fulmineosque sues, et sicubi maxima tigris."
Achil. ii. 409.
" Tigris] Animal est truculentum et velocissimum, quo et India et
Hyrcania abundat : ejusdem nominis est etiam fluvius Armenia."
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 213.
" Because that now it lies you on to speak
To the people ; not by your own instruction,
Nor by the matter which your heart prompts you,
But with such words that are but rated in
Your tongue, though but bastards, and syllables
Of no allowance to your bosom's truth."
The folios have " roated." — Read " rooted."
M
162 CORIOLANUS.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 220.
" I have been consul, and can show from Rome,
Her enemies' marks upon me."
" Another instance of the licentious use of prepositions in Shake-
speare's time — 'from Rome,' instead of for Rome. Theobald need-
lessly substituted /or." COLLIER.
Malone, who retained the old reading, did not venture to
assert, as Mr. Collier does, that "from" was used here instead
of "for" (an example of which usage coif Id not be shewn in any
writer either of verse or prose)', but his defence of "from" is
sufficiently ridiculous ; he tells us, that Cominius " either means
that his wounds were got out of Rome, in the cause of his
country, or that they mediately were derived from Rome, by
his acting in conformity to the orders of the state."
(When Theobald made his certain emendation " for," he
adduced from the same play ;
"To banish him that struck more blows for Rome" &c.
Act iv. sc. 2.
" Good man, the wounds that he does bear for Rome !"
Ibid.
to which may be added ;
" But since he hath
Serv'd well for Rome." Act iii. sc. 3.
" Which were inshell'd when Marcius stood for Rome."
Act iv. sc. 6.)
In Julius Ccesar, act iii. sc. 1, vol. vii. 53, we find ;
"for mine eyes,
Seeing those beads of sorrow stand in thine,
Began to water."
where Mr. Collier remarks, " So the second folio, rightly : the
first has 'from mine eyes.'"
In the latter passage, the editor of the second folio recti-
fied the error of the first ; in the former, which required the
same correction, he happened to overlook it.
This is a very common misprint. The first quarto of
Beaumont and Fletcher's Wit without Money has (act i.
sc. 1),
' ' My brother and myself will run one fortune,
CORIOLANUS. 163
And, I think , what I hold a mere vexation
Cannot be safe/rom him."
where the later old eds. give, as the sense demands, " for."
ACT V.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 246.
" A pair of tribunes, that have wreck 'd for Rome,
To make coals cheap, a noble memory !"
" The meaning of this passage seems to have been hitherto mis-
taken, and therefore always printed,
' A pair of tribunes that have rack'd for Rome,
To make coals cheap : A noble memory !'
Menenius intends to say that the tribunes have wrecked a noble
memory for Rome by occasioning its destruction. Mr. Amyot con-
curs in this new interpretation. In the old copies it is printed
wrack' d, the ordinary orthography of the time for ' wreck'd/ and not
for rack'd." COLLIER.
In spite of Mr. Amyot's approbation, I cannot but think
that Mr. Collier has pointed and interpreted this passage most
erroneously. The first folio gives it literatim thus ;
" A paire of Tribunes, that have wrack'd for Rome,
To make Coales cheape : A Noble memory."
where (as the other modern editors rightly understand the
word) " wrack'd" is merely the old (and not very unusual)
spelling of " rack'd .•" so in King Lear, act v. sc. 3, according
to the three earliest folios ;
" he hates him,
That would vpon the wracke of this tough world
Stretch him out longer."
in Beaumont and Fletcher's Faithful Friends, act i. scene 1,
according to the MS. (now before me) from which Weber
published that play ;
" My Soules wrackt, till you dissolue my feares."
/. e.
" My soul is rack'd, till you dissolve my fears."
164 CORIOLANUS.
and in the 4to, 1640, of Fletcher's Bloody Brother, or Rollo
Duke of Normandy, act i. sc. 1 ;
" Why is this warre then ?
As if your armes could be advanc'd, and I
Not set upon the wracks ?"
where the 4to, 1639, and the folio, 1679, have " rack."
(Several other words, which, according to our present or-
thography, commence with the letter r, were formerly some-
times written with wr : for instance, in Shakespeare's Henry
' VIII. act i. sc. 1, all the folios have
" and like a glasse
Did breake ith' wrenching ."
i. e. as all the modern editors print, " rinsing ;" in Lyly's
Maides Metamorphosis, 1600, sig. F 3, we find,
" I wreake not of such loue."
i. e. " reck ;" in the MS. of The Faithful Friends above men-
tioned, act iii. sc. 3,
" And am transported into paradice,
Wrapt aboue apprehension, to behold," &c.
i. e. " Rapt ;" in Cartwright's verses To the Memory of Ben
Johnson Laureat, — Works, 1651, p. 311,
" Father of Poets, though thine own great Day
Struck from thyself, scorns that a weaker, wra^
Should twine in Lustre with it, yet my flame
Kindled from thine, flies upward towards thy name."
! i. e. " ray ;" and in two Addresses To the Readers prefixed to
the Duchess of Newcastle's Playes, 1662, " a good memory to
learn, and get the Parts by heart or wrote" (Sec. Ad.)
" so as they only Act as Parrots speak, by wrote" (Fourth
Ad.), i. e. "rote").
"A noble memory!" is spoken ironically, — "memory"
meaning here ' memorial,' as in act iv. sc. 5 of the present
play, and in innumerable passages of early writers, besides
the following one ;
" Turn all the stories over in the world yet,
And search through all the memories of mankind," &c.
Fletcher's Mad Lover, act v. sc. 4.
CORIOLANUS. 165
Besides, is not Mr. Collier's " new interpretation" incon-
sistent with the feelings of an ancient Roman, who would
have scorned the very idea of Rome's "memory" being
" wreck'd," even if the Volscians had burned the city to the
ground ?
166
TITUS ANDRONICUS.
[Vol. vi. COLLIER ; Sup. vol., Doubtful Plays, &c., Pict. ed. KNIGHT.*]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 286 ; K. p. 13.
" In readiness for Hymeneus stand."
So the other modern editors. — Read " Hymenaous."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 288.
" My lord, — to step out of these dreary dumps," &c.
" The folio ' sudden dumps,' which is evidently wrong." COLLIER.
The reading of the folio, " sudden" is a misprint for " sul-
len."
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 320.
" Lavinia, thou shalt be employed in these things."
"The two quartos have arms for 'things:' ' things' is certainly
a poor word; but it is not perhaps possible to ascertain for what
arms was misprinted in the earlier copies." COLLIER.
The reading of the quartos, " arms" is undoubtedly a mis-
print for " aims :" see p. 130 of the present work.
ACT v.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 353.
" Tarn. Farewell, Andronicus : Revenge now goes
To lay a complot to betray thy foes.
Tit. I know thou dost ; and, sweet Revenge, farewell."
Insert, after the last speech, " [Exit Tamora"
* See note, p. 158.
167
ROMEO AND JULIET.
[Vol. vi. COLLIER ; vol. vii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 375 ; K. p. 286.
" Sam. 'Tis all one, I will show myself a tyrant : when I have
fought with the men, I will be civil with the maids ; I will cut off
their heads.
Gre. The heads of the maids ?
Sam. Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads," &c.
" The quarto, 1597, has not the word; but the quartos, 1599
and 1609, together with the folio, 1623, have ' civil.' It was perhaps
a misprint for cruel, as the undated edition gives it ; but Sampson
may mean to speak ironically." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight also retains "civil"!! — That Beaumont and
Fletcher saw no civility in such a proceeding, is evident from
the following parallel passages ;
" A cannibal, that feeds on the heads of maids,
Then flings their bones and bodies to the devil."
" this common hangman,
That hath whipt off the heads of a thousand maids already," &c.
The Custom of the Country, act i. sc. 1.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 380 ; K. p. 290.
" As is the bud bit with an envious worm,
Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air,
Or dedicate his beauty to the same."
Mr. Collier, who has taken the trouble to chronicle a great
many wretched conjectures, does not even mention Theobald's
emendation of the present passage — " sun, or, according to the
more obsolete spelling, sunne" — an emendation which has
been adopted by Steevens and by Mr. Knight, and which I have
not the slightest doubt is the genuine reading. Both sun and
son were very frequently written sunne and sonne, and hence
168 ROMEO AND JULIET.
were often mistaken for other words by the old compositors :
see Mr. Collier's notes, vol. v. 347, vi. 555. We also find in
early books not a few passages in which " same" is a misprint :
so in Troilus and Cressida, act ii. sc. 2, vol. vi. 47, where the
right reading is undoubtedly "sieve," the folio has "same"
Malone retained " same" in the present passage, with the
following note ;
" In the last Act of this play our poet has evidently imitated the
Rosamond of Daniel ; and in the present passage might have remem-
bered the following lines in one of the Sonnets of the same writer,
who was then extremely popular. The lines, whether remembered
by our author or not, add such support to Mr. Theobald's emenda-
tion, that I should have given it a place in my text, but that the
other mode of expression was not uncommon in Shakspeare's time :
' And whilst thou spread' st unto the rising sunne,
The fairest flower that ever saw the light,
Now joy thy time, before thy sweet be done.'
Daniel's Sonnets, 1594.
A similar phraseology to that of my text may be found in Daniel's
14th, 32d, 44th, and 53d Sonnets."
But the reading in the text receives no confirmation from
what Malone calls the " similar phraseology" of Daniel ; for
in every one of the passages which he refers to (and which I
now subjoin), it is evident that the words, " the same" were
forced upon the poet by the necessity of the rhyme ;
" Strong is the net, and feruent is the flame ;
Deepe is the wound my sighes can well report :
Yet do I loue, adore, and prayse the same,
That holds, that burnes, that wounds me in this sort."
Son. xiv.
" Danger hath honor, great designes their fame,
Glory doth follow, courage goes before :
And though th' euent oft answers not the same,
Suffice that high attempts haue neuer shame."
Son. xxxii.
" There do these smoakes that from affliction rise,
Serue as an incense to a cruell dame ;
A sacrifice thrice- gratefull to her eyes
Because their power serue to exact the same."
Son. xliv.
ROMEO AND JULIET. 169
" So, Delia, hath mine error made me knowne,
And my deceiu'd attempt deseru'd more fame,
Then if I had the victory mine owne,
And thy hard heart had yeelded vp the same."
Son. liii.
Besides, Malone ought to have recollected that, though Daniel
was often dreadfully flat, Shakespeare never was.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 387 ; K. p. 296.
" Tut ! you saw her fair, none else being by,
Herself pois'd with herself in either eye ;
But in those crystal scales, let there be weigh'd
Your lady's love against some other maid,
That I will show you shining at this feast,
And she shall scant show well, that now shows best."
" The old copies have, ' that crystal scales/ The emendation
by Howe." COLLIER.
What Mr. Collier terms "the emendation" is, in fact, a j
very improper change : " scales," as Mr. Knight observes, is
used here as a singular noun ; and so it was frequently em-
ployed by the poet's contemporaries.
" ' Your lady's love,' " says Heath, " is the love you bear to
your lady, which in our language is commonly used for the
lady herself." To me at least this explanation is unsatisfac-
tory : qy. did Shakespeare write " Your lady-love" ?
SCENE 3.— C. p. 389.
" For then she could stand alone."
"The quarto, 1597, has it, 'For then could Juliet stand high
lone,' which the quarto, 1599, prints hylone." COLLIER.
It may perhaps be worth while to notice, that we find in
Middleton's Blurt, Master Constable, " An old comb-pecked
rascal, that was beaten out a' th' cock-pit, when I could not
stand a' high lone without I held by a thing, to come crowing
among us!" Act ii. sc. 2, — Works, i. 262, ed. Dyce; and
170 ROMEO AND JULIET.
in W. Rowley's A Skoomaker a Gentleman, 1638, " The warres
has lam'd many of my old customers, they cannot go a Me
lone" Sig. B 4.
ACT 11.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 406.
" But, soft ! what light through yonder window breaks ?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun !"
When Shakespeare wrote this passage, he seems to have
recollected the following lines of Marlowe ;
" But stay ; what star shines yonder in the east ?
The loadstar of my life, if Abigail."
The Jew of Malta (near the commencement of act ii.).
SCENE 4.— C. p. 420.
" Rom. I stretch it out for that word — broad : which added to
the goose, proves thee far and wide abroad — goose."
"So the folio, 1623: all older editions have, 'proves thee far
and wide, a broad goose.' " COLLIER.
" All older editions" are right; for the reading which Mr.
Collier has preferred, instead of " adding broad to the goose,"
entirely separates the words.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 423.
" I am none of his flirt-gills ; I am none of his sJcains -mates."
" Possibly, as M alone suggests, ' skains-mates' means knife- com-
panions, or cut-throat companions, from skain or skene, a knife or
short dagger. Skene is used by many writers of the time," &c. &c.
COLLIER.
This interpretation cannot be right, because the Nurse is
evidently speaking of Mercutio's female companions. The
meaning of skains-mates (if not a misprint, which I suspect
it is) remains yet to be discovered.
ROMEO AND JULIET. 171
SCENE 4.— C. p. 425.
" Ah, mocker ! that's the dog's name. R is for thee ? no : I know
it begins with some other letter," &c.
" The meaning of this passage seems to have been hitherto mis-
taken, owing to ' thee' in the old copies (as was often the case) having
been misprinted the : it there runs thus, ' R is for the no/ The
Nurse means to ask, ' how can R, which is the dog's name, be for
thee ¥ And she answers herself, ' no : I know Romeo begins with
some other letter.' The modern text, at the suggestion of Tyrwhitt,
has usually been, ' R is for the dog. No ; I know,' &c., but no
change is necessary beyond the mere alteration of the to ' thee.' It
is singular that this trifling change should not have been suggested
before." COLLIER.
Mr. Collier is not aware that the " trifling change" which
he has made here, was not only proposed by Warburton,
but, at his suggestion, inserted in the text by Theobald. I
think it quite wrong ; " R is for thee ?" being by no means a
simple or natural mode of putting the question. The strong
probability is, that the word " dog" (as Tyrwhitt conjectured)
lias dropt out from the text.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 438 ; K. p. 352.
" Spread thy close curtain, love-performing night !
That, unawares, eyes may wink, and Romeo
Leap to these arms, untalk'd of, and unseen !"
" Every old copy has, ' That run-away s eyes may wink.' Zachary
Jackson, in his ' Shakspeare's Genius Justified,' 8vo. 1819, p. 421,
has shown that run-aways was, in all probability, a misprint for
' unawares.' The meaning will therefore be, as he suggests, « that
eyes may be closed in sleep unawares.' " COLLIER.
" This passage has been a perpetual source of contention to the
commentators. Their difficulties are well represented by Warbur-
ton's question — ' What runaways are these, whose eyes Juliet is
wishing to have stopped ?' Warburton says Phoebus is the runaway.
Steevens proves that Night is the runaway. Douce thinks that Juliet
is the runaway. It has been suggested to us that in several early \
poems Cupid is styled Runaway. Monk Mason is confident that the
ROMEO AND JULIET.
passage ought to be 'That Renomy's eyes may wink,' Renomy being
a new personage, created out of the French Renommee, and answer-
ing, we suppose, to the ' Rumour' of Spenser. An unlearned com-
positor, Zachary Jackson, suggests that runaways is a misprint for
unawares. The word unawares, in the old orthography, is unawayres
(it is so spelt in ' The Third Part of Henry VI.'), and the r, having
been misplaced, produced this word of puzzle, runawayes. We have
not the least hesitation in adopting Jackson's reading ; and we have
the authority of a very clever article in ' Blackwood's Magazine' (July,
1819) for a general testimony to the value of Jackson's book ; and
the equally valuable authority of a most accomplished friend, who
called our attention to this particular reading, as settled by the com-
mon sense of the printer." KNIGHT.
I cannot allow that the reading in this passage has been
" settled" by Jackson (about the value of whose book I think
very differently from Mr. Knight and the writer in Black-
wood's Mag.) : I do not believe that Shakespeare would have
used such an expression as " that unawares eyes may wink."
That " ways" (the last syllable of " run-aways") ought to be
" Day's" I feel next to certain ; but what word originally
preceded it I do not pretend to determine :
" Spread thy close curtain, love-performing Night !
That ? ( Day's eyes may wink, and Romeo
soon }
Leap to these arms, untalk'd of, and unseen !"
Compare Macbeth ;
" Come, seeling night,
Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day," &c.
Act iii. sc. 2.
The passages in our early poets about Night spreading her
curtains, and Day closing her eyes, are numerous : so in Dray-
ton ;
" The sullen Night hath her black Curtaines spred,
Lowring the Day hath tarried vp so long,
Whose faire eyes closing softly steales to bed," &c.
Barons Warres, b. iii. st. 17, ed. 8vo.
(This stanza is very different in the folio ed.)
ROMEO AND JULIET. 173
SCENE 3.— C. p. 445 ; K. p. 357.
" More validity,
More honourable state, more courtship lives
In carrion flies, than Romeo : they may seize
On the white wonder of dear Juliet's hand,
And steal immortal blessing from her lips ;
Who, even in pure and vestal modesty,
Still blush, as thinking their own kisses sin ;
This may flies do, when I from this must fly :
And say'st thou yet, that exile is not death ?
But Romeo may not ; he is banished.
Flies may do this, but I from this must fly :
They are free men, but I am banished."
" In printing this [' They are free men, but I am banished'] and
the four preceding lines we follow the editions of 1599 and 1609.
In the folio the empassioned repetition of ' Flies may do this, but I
from this must fly,' was, it should seem, not allowed for, and that and
the following line were, therefore, as we think, unnecessarily omitted,"
COLLIER.
Mr. Collier is the only editor who has supposed that Shake-
speare would make Romeo utter the very same conceit twice
over in the course of a few lines : the repetition which he ad-
mires so greatly is nothing more than one of the innumerable
varies lectiones of this tragedy.
Mr. Knight, except that he wisely omits (with the folio),
" Flies may do this, but I from this must fly :
They are free men, but I am banished,"
gives the passage as Mr. Collier does ; neither of them perceiv-
ing that the line,
" But Romeo may not ; he is banished,"
is quite out of its place.
In such a passage as this, where hideous confusion has
arisen from the various readings, it is absolutely necessary
that an editor should do his endeavour to rectify that con-
fusion : he should neither jumble two texts together like
Mr. Collier, nor slavishly follow one particular text like Mr.
Knight.
174 ROMEO AND JULIET.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 406; K. p. 378.
" Now, when the bridegroom in the morning comes
To rouse thee from thy bed, there art thou dead :
Then, as the manner of our country is,
In thy best robes uncover'd on the bier,
Be borne to burial in thy kindred's grave :
Thou shaft be borne to that same ancient vault,
Where all the kindred of the Capulets lie.'1
Another silly repetition ! ! The line,
" Be borne to burial in thy kindred's grave,"
is a various lection of the two lines ;
" Thou shalt be borne to that same ancient vault,
Where all the kindred of the Capulets lie."
Mr. Knight, who also retains the superfluous line, informs
us that " * Be borne' means ' to be borne ;' " but I apprehend
that he would search the poetry of England in vain for an-
other example of such an ellipsis.
When Beaumont and Fletcher imitated the passage, they
were content with one reading;
" and thus thought dead,
In her best habit, as the custom is,
You know, in Malta, with all ceremonies
She's buried in her family's monument
In the temple of St. John."
The Knight of Malta, act iv. sc. 1
SCENE 3.— C. p. 471 ; K. p. 382.
" O, look ! methinks, I see my cousin's ghost
Seeking out Romeo, that did spit his body
Upon a rapier's point. — Stay, Tybalt, stay ! —
Romeo ! Romeo f Romeo ! — here's drink — / drink to thee."
Mr. Collier, in a note, cites a portion of this soliloquy as it
stands in the quarto of 1597, where the concluding line is,
" Romeo, I come ! this do I drink to thee."
ROMEO AND JULIET. 175
which, he observes, " has been the ordinary modern reading,
and on some accounts may seem preferable ; but the ' cor-
rected, augmented, and amended' edition of 1599, and all
subsequent impressions, quarto and folio, give it as in our
text."
In his Introduction to the play, Mr. Collier remarks that
he has been " in some places importantly assisted by the
quarto of 1597." p. 369. He ought, I think, by all means to
have had recourse to its assistance in the conclusion of the
present speech, instead of adopting a line which has been re-
jected by all other editors except Mr. Knight, and which is
partly composed of a stage-direction, — "Here drink" having
avidently crept into the text, and become " here's drink."
SCENE 5.— C. p. 477 ; K. p. 387.
" Nurse. Honest good fellows, ah ! put up, put up ; for, well you
know, this is a pitiful case."
The present speech is (like all the preceding speeches of
the Nurse in this scene) verse ; and as such Mr. Knight rightly
gives it.
ACT v.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 488 ; K. p. 399.
"Par. I do defy thy commiseration,
And apprehend thee for a felon here."
"The quarto, 1597 . . reads, 'I do defy thy conjurations ;
which some editors have preferred, against all the subsequent autho-
rities, excepting that in the quarto, 1599, 'commiseration' is mis-
printed commiration. The sense of 'commiseration' is clear; not so
of conjurations." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight also gives " commiseration," — a reading which,
besides violating the metre, is on the very verge of the ludi-
crous. It is a stark misprint ; and the progress of the corrup-
tion is plain enough. The quarto of 1599 having " commira-
tion" (an error for " coniuration," — the editor of that quarto
perhaps preferring the word in the singular), the said vox
nihili was altered in subsequent editions to " commiseration."
176 ROMEO AND JULIET.
With respect to " the sense of conjurations" which Mr.
Collier thinks is " not clear," — surely, in the speech, to which
the present one is an answer, Romeo had sufficiently conjured
Paris, when he said,
" Good gentle youth, tempt not a desperate man ;
Fly hence and leave me : — think upon these gone ;
Let them affright thee. — I beseech thee, youth,
Put not another sin upon my head,
By urging me to fury : — O, be gone !" &c.
As the commentators, though they observe that " defy "
means ' reject, refuse to comply with,' give no example of
"conjuration" in the sense of 'earnest entreaty' (which it
often bore), I subjoin the following passage ;
" Hen. Mother and Leycester, adde not oyle to fire :
Wrath's kindled with a word, and cannot heare
The numberlesse perswasions you insort [sic] .
Quee. O, but, my sonne, thy father fauours him :
Richard that vile abortiue changling brat,
And Faukenbridge, are fallen at Henries feete ;
They wooe for him : but [I] intreat, my sonne,
Gloster may dye for this that he hath done.
Leic. If Gloster Hue, thou wilt be ouerthrowne.
Quee. If Gloster Hue, thy mother dies in moane.
Ley. If Gloster Hue, Leyster will flie the realme.
Quee. If Gloster Hue, thy kingdome's but a dreame.
Hen. Haue I not sworne by that eternall arme
That puts iust vengance sword in Monarcks hands,
Gloster shall die for his presumption ?
What needs more coniuration, gratious Mother ?" &c.
A Pleasant Commodie, called Looke about you
1600, sig. D 3.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 489.
"Ah! dear Juliet,
Why art thou yet so fair ? / will believe —
Shall I believe that unsubstantial death is amorous ;
And that the lean abhorred monster keeps
Thee here in dark to be his paramour ?"
"We give the text as it stands in every old copy, quarto and
ROMEO AND JULIET. 177
folio, excepting the quarto, 1597, where all that is said is, ' O ! I
believe that unsubstantial death is amorous,' &c. Romeo first asserts
that he will believe, then checks himself, and puts it interrogatively,
whether he shall believe that death is amorous ?" COLLIER.
In the first place, nothing can be more evident (even if it
were not intimated by the reading of 4to, 1597) than that " I
will believe " and " Shall I believe " are varice lectiones, one
of which must be rejected (and all the other modern editors
agree in throwing out the former). Secondly, Shakespeare was
too well acquainted with the workings of the human mind to
mak-e Romeo "first assert that he will believe," and then put
it interrogatively : in such cases, the question precedes the
determination. Thirdly, the preposterous reading given by
Mr. Collier introduces an unwieldy verse of fifteen syllables
into a speech, of which the other forty-six lines are strictly
correct in measure, and most exquisite for their varied har-
mony.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 492 ; K. p. 403.
" Jul. Yea, noise ? — then I'll be brief. — O happy dagger !
[Snatching ROMEO'S Dagger.
This is thy sheath ; [Stabs herself;'] there rust, and let me die.
[Dies"
" Is the reading of the quarto, 1599, and later impressions. The
quarto, 1597, gives the passage thus : —
' Ay, noise ? then must I be resolute.
O, happy dagger ! thou shalt end my fear ;
Rest in my bosom. Thus I come to thee.' "
COLLIER.
In several earlier passages of the play, the 4to, 1597, alone
supplies the true reading ; and I suspect that here too it is
right, — I mean so far as it has " rest" instead of " rust." The
former appears to me the more natural expression : at such a
moment, the thoughts of Juliet were not likely to wander
away to the future rusting of the dagger; she only wishes it,
by resting in her bosom as in its sheath, to give her instant
death.
178
TIMON OF ATHENS.
[Vol. vi. COLLIER; vol. ix. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 517 ; K. p. 202.
" They say, my lords, ir a furor brevis est,
But yond' man is ever angry."
" ' Very angry' in the folio. Rowe made the change, which
seems necessary." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight, however, retains the misprint of the folios :
" Rowe," he says, " changed very to ever, marking an anti-
thesis with the Latin sentence. The introduction of a scrap
of Latin is not at all in Shakspere's manner, nor indeed is
any part of the speech."
In the first place, the writer of the speech (whether
Shakespeare or not) evidently intended to contrast " furor
brevis" with " ever angry." Secondly, " very" is a common
typographical error for " ever :" a line of Beaumont and
Fletcher's King and No King (act iv. sc. 4) had been rightly
given in all editions, —
" Children and fools are ever credulous,"
till 1812, when Weber's printer altered it thus;
" Children and fools are very credulous."
I may add, that we find in Beaumont and Fletcher's
Valentinian ;
" If my good master be not ever angry,
You shall command again."
Act iii. sc. 3.
ACT II.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 528 ; K. p. 215.
" How goes the world, that I am thus encounter'd
With clamorous demands of debt, broken bonds,
TIMON OF ATHENS. 179
And the detention of long-since-due debts,
Against my honour ?"
" So the old copies uniformly. Malone altered the text to
' date-broken, bonds,' which may be said to derive some countenance
from the next line ; but we feel bound, as no change is required by
the sense, to adhere to the words of the poet, as far as they have
been handed down to us in the folio, 1623." COLLIER.
So too Mr. Knight, who observes ;
" We print this passage as in the original, Malone reads, —
* With clamorous demands of date-broken bonds.'
It scarcely appears to us that any change is necessary; for ' the
detention of long -since-due debts' is merely an amplification of the
' clamorous demands of debt.' "
Now, Malone's correction is, as he himself remarks, esta-
blished beyond a doubt by a passage in the preceding scene
(a passage which Mr. Collier and Mr. Knight have prudently
forborne to mention), viz. ;
" his days and times are past,
And my reliances on hisfracted dates
Have smit my credit."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 532 ; K. p. 219.
" So the gods bless me,
When all our offices have been oppress 'd
With riotous feeders ; when our vaults have wept
With drunken spilth of wine ; when every room
Hath blaz'd with lights, and bray' d with minstrelsy,
/ have retir'd me to a wasteful cock,
And set mine eyes at flow."
" This passage has occasioned a good deal of comment : the
' wasteful cock' seems to mean the flowing eyes of Flavius, which
ran to waste, in vain grief at his lord's boundless expenditure. Pope,
not understanding the allusion, substituted ' lonely room ;' and Sir
T. Hanmer took ' wasteful cock' to be a cock-loft, ' a garret lying
in waste.'" COLLIER.
Mr. Collier's remark, that in the line,
" I have retir'd me to a wasteful cock,"
180 TIMON OF ATHENS.
"the * wasteful cock' seems to mean the flowing eyes of Fla-
vins" is the more astounding, since that line is immediately
followed by
" AND set mine eyes at flow''
Nares (Gloss, in v. Wasteful) and Mr. Knight refer the
" wasteful cock" to the preceding " spilth of wine " Mr.
Knight, moreover, wishing to alter the text (which I believe
to be free from any corruption) to
" I have retired me from a wasteful cock."
One thing is quite clear, — that " wasteful cock" can only
mean ' a pipe with a turning stopple running to waste,' whe-
ther we refer it to the " spilth of wine," or whether we adopt
the following interpretation by Capell ;
" Cock is — cock of water, and wasteful — running to waste, in
some outhouse or place adjoining; for the thought of retiring to
such a cock is suggested by what was passing within doors." — Notes
and Various Readings, &c., vol. ii. 81.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 539 ; K. p. 226.
" 1 Stran. Why this
Is the world's soul ; and just of the same piece
Is every flatterer's sport."
" We adhere to the old reading, thinking that it affords at least
as good a meaning as the modern change of ' sport' to spirit."
COLLIER.
Mr. Knight also retains " sport ;" which appears to me to
be the veriest nonsense.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 549 ; K. p. 234.
" 2 Sen. You breathe in vain.
Alcib. In vain ? his service done
At Lacedsemon, and Byzantium,
Were a sufficient briber for his life.
1 Sen. What's that ?
Alcib. Why, say, my lords, he has done fair service,
And slain in fight many of your enemies.
TIMON OF ATHENS. 181
How full of valour did he bear himself
In the last conflict, and made plenteous wounds ?
2 Sen. He has made too much plenty with him,
He's a sworn rioter," &c.
" The folio, 1632, reads, ' Why, /say, my lords,' &c., but need-
lessly, the meaning being, ' Why, admit, or acknowledge, my lords,
that he has done fair service.' " COLLIER.
Mr. Knight also gives (without any note) the reading of the
first folio ; which is manifestly wrong.
" Why, say" means " Why, admit, or acknowledge," only
when the speaker is either himself admitting, or requiring others
to admit, something, before he proceeds to discuss the matter in
question. But here Alcibiades is riot arguing ; he is making
a simple assertion, — repeating with greater emphasis what he
has previously stated ;
" Why, / say, my lords, he has done fair service," &c.
The point after " wounds" ought to be (as in Mr. Knight's
edition) a point of admiration.
In the last of the above speeches, " him" which Mr. Col-
lier (in opposition to the other modern editors) has adopted
from the first folio, makes the passage nonsense : the second
folio gives the obvious correction, "'em." That "him" and
" 'em" were frequently confounded by early printers, has been
already shewn : see p. 64.
ACT IV.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 566 ; K. p. 252.
" What ! think'st
That the bleak air, thy boisterous chamberlain,
Will put thy shirt on warm ? Will these moist trees,
That have outliv'd the eagle, page thy heels,
And skip when thou point'st out ?"
On the reading, " moist," Mr. Collier says ne verbum qui-
dem. Mr. Knight, who also gives it, has the following note ;
" This epithet was changed by Hanmer to mossd. Whiter, upon
his principle of the association of ideas, thus explains the use of the
word moist : — ' Warm and moist were the appropriate terms in the
182 TIMON OF ATHENS.
days of Shakespeare for what we should now call an air'd and a damp
shirt. So John Florio (Second Frutes, 1591), in a dialogue between
the master Torquato and his servant Ruspa : —
T. Dispatch, and give me a shirt !
R. Here is one with ruffs.
T. Thou dolt, seest thou not how moyst it is ?
R. Pardon me, good sir, I was not aware of it.
T. Go into the kitchen and warme it.'
Can the reader doubt (though he may perhaps smile at the asso-
ciation) that the image of the chamberlain putting the shirt on warm,
impressed the opposite word moist on the imagination of the poet ?"
If the reader of Winter's explanation " smiles," it ought
to be with contempt at such ingenious trifling. " Moist" (an
epithet of no propriety here) is clearly the transcriber's or
printer's error for " mosst" (moss'd). The tree under which
Oliver lay sleeping had its boughs " moss'd with age" As you
like it, act iv. sc. 3. So the trees to which Apemantus here
refers were " moss'd" — they had " outliv'd the eagle"
SCENE 3. — C. p. 573.
" Steal not less, for this
I give you; and gold confound you howsoe'er ! Amen."
In scene 1 of this act, p. 556, Mr. Collier prints ;
" And grant, as Timon grows, his hate may grow
To the whole race of mankind, high and low !
Amen."
In the present passage also he ought to have placed
"Amen" in a line by itself.
ACT V.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 588 ; K. p. 272.
" Then, dear countryman,
Bring in thy ranks, but leave without thy rage :
Spare thy Athenian cradle, and those kin,
Which in the bluster of thy wrath must fall
With those that have offended. Like a shepherd,
TIMON OF ATHENS. 183
Approach the fold, and call th' infected forth,
But kill not altogether.'9
(Mr. Knight in his Pictorial Shakspere gave " altogether ;"
but in his Library Edition he has properly changed it to " all
together.")
Malone, like Mr. Collier, prints " altogether.'" Did they
not know that our early transcribers and printers were in the
habit of confounding " altogether" and " all together ?" The
latter is as certainly the true reading here as it is in the fol-
lowing passage of the Sec. Part of King Henry VI. act i. sc. 1 ,
which, however, all the old editions exhibit thus ;
" Cosin of Somerset, ioyne you with me,
And altogether with the Duke of Suffolke,
Wee'l quickly hoyse Duke Humfrey from his seat."
SCENE 5.— C. p. 589; K. p. 273.
" not a man
Shall pass his quarter, or offend the stream
Of regular justice in your city's bounds,
But shall be remedied to your public laws
At heaviest answer."
" We may suspect that ' remedied ' ought to have been printed
rendered. The folio, 1632, and those of 1664 and 1685 after it, read,
' remedied by your public laws.' " COLLIER.
Malone also, with a singularly foolish note, and Mr.
Knight with no note at all, retain "remedied" though it is
obviously a misprint for " render'd."
184
JULIUS OESAR.
[Vol. vii. COLLIER; vol. ii. Tragedies, Pict. ed. KNIGHT.*]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 8.
" Truly, sir, all that I live by is, with the awl : I meddle with no
tradesman's matters, nor women's matters, but with all. I am, indeed,
sir, a surgeon to old shoes."
" Printed withal in the old editions, and without any stop, so that
the reading may merely be, ' but withal I am indeed, sir, a surgeon
to old shoes.' " COLLIER.
The passage is of such a nature, that I can only notice
Mr. Collier's conjecture by expressing my surprise that he
should have offered it.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 12 ; K p. 229.
" Were I a common laugher, or did use
To stale with ordinary oaths my love
To every new protester," &c.
" i. e. says Johnson, To invite every new protester to my affection
by the stale or allurement of customary oaths." COLLIER.
The above note by Johnson (the only one on this passage
in the Var. Shakespeare) is altogether wrong. Mr. Knight
has no comment here. — " To stale my love" means ' to make
it stale, to make it cheap and common.' So Jonson ;
" He's grown a stranger to all due respect,
Forgetful of his friends ; and not content
To stale himself in all societies,
He makes my house here common as a mart," &c.
Every Man in his Humour, act ii. sc. 1, —
Works, i. 42, ed. Gifford.
and see my remarks on Coriolanus, p. 158.
* See note, p. 158.
JULIUS C^SAR. 185
SCENE 3. — C. p. 23.
" You speak to Casca ; and to such a man,
That is no fleering tell-tale. Hold, my hand"
Here Mr. Collier rightly follows the punctuation of the
old eds. The expression is elliptical : if complete, it would be
" Hold, there's my hand,"— like
" Holde, ther's ray swoord, and with my swoord my heart."
A Pleasant Commodie, called Looke about you,
1600, sig. E 4.
Messrs. Malone and Knight print, "Hold my hand," —
which, says Johnson, " is the same as ' Here's my hand :' "
very erroneously; for the words, without a comma after
"Hold" could only mean ( Stop or restrain my hand.'
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 27 ; K. p. 238.
" Between the acting of a dreadful thing
And the first motion, all the interim is
Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream :
The Genius, and the mortal instruments,
Are then in council ; and the state of a man,
Like to a little kingdom, suffers then
The nature of an insurrection."
Mr. Collier has no comment here. — Mr. Knight also retains
the reading of the old eds., and defends it in a note. For
my own part, I am convinced that "a" is the barbarous and
impertinent addition of a transcriber or printer. Compare
the following passages ;
" My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical,
Shakes so my single state of man, that function
Is smother'd in surmise, and nothing is,
But what is not." Macbeth, act i. sc. 3.
(In the passage just cited both Mr. Collier and Mr. Knight
leave the word " single" unexplained : I may therefore notice
that Gifford (Jonson's Works, ii. 74) decidedly understood it
to mean, — what Steevens had supposed that it perhaps might
mean, — * weak.')
186 JULIUS CAESAR.
" Strives in his little world of man to out- scorn
The to-and-fro-conflicting wind and rain."
King Lear, act iii. sc. 1,
SCENE 2.— C. p. 39 ; K. p. 242.
" She dream'd to-night she saw my statue,
Which, like a fountain," &c.
" The word ' statue' in the time of Shakespeare was frequently
pronounced as a trisyllable, and it is necessary in this line, as well as
afterwards, A. iii. sc. 2,
' And at the base of Pompey's statue ;'
which is usually, but needlessly, printed statua. See also Vol. v.
pp. 166 and 428, where the same error is pointed out." COLLIER.
So too Mr. Knight, without any note.
But we know for certain that the form statua was very
frequently used, not only by writers of all descriptions during
the days of Shakespeare, but also by those who flourished at a
late period of the seventeenth century : see Todd's Johnson's
Diet, in v. Statue ; and compare the following passage in a
copy of verses by Jobn Harris, prefixed to the folio of Beau-
mont and Fletcher's Works, 1647 ;
" Base hands, how impotently you disclose
Your rage 'gainst Camden's learned ashes, whose
Defaced statua and martyr' d book
Like an antiquity and fragment look !"
I therefore have not the slightest doubt that wherever statue
occurs, while the metre requires three syllables, it is a typo-
graphical error for statua. Our old poets no more thought of
using statue as a trisyllable than stature, a third form of the
word, which is not unfrequently found ;
" The Trophic Arches, where to life Triumphants were purtraide,
The Statures huge, of Porphyrie and costlier matters made," &c.
Warner's Albions England, p. 303, ed. 1596.
" The golden stature of their feather 'd bird,
That spreads her wings upon the city-walls," &c.
Marlowe's Tamburlaine (First Part), act iv. sc. 2.
"By them shal Isis stature gently stand."
Chapman's Blind Begger of Alexandria, 1598, sig. A 3.
JULIUS CLESAR. 187
ACT IV.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 73.
" Bru. Impatient of my absence,
And grief, that young Octavius with Mark Antony
Have made themselves so strong ; — for with her death
That tidings came. — With this she fell distract,
And, her attendants absent, swallow'd fire."
The full-point after " came," which Mr. Collier has brought
back from the old editions, could never have been intended
by Shakespeare. The whole speech is one broken sentence,
(which admirably marks the struggle of Brutus with his feel-
ings), and ought to stand thus ;
" Impatient of my absence,
And grief that young Octavius with Mark Antony
Have made themselves so strong ; — for with her death
That tidings came ; — with this she fell distract,
And, her attendants absent, swallow'd fire."
188
MACBETH.
[Vol. vii. COLLIER ; vol. ii. Tragedies, Pict. ed. KNIGHT.*]
ACT I.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 104.
" The weird sisters."
" As Steevens remarks, Gawin Douglas, in his translation of the
^Eneid, calls the Parccz ' the weird sisters.'" COLLIER.
But Steevens also remarked that " weird[s] was used for
the Destinies by Chaucer;" and, as perhaps the next editor
of Shakespeare may think that so early an instance of the
word ought to be cited, I subjoin the passage to which Stee-
vens doubtless referred ;
" But o fortune, executrice of wierdes" &c.
Troll, and Cres.b. iii. 618.
I may notice too, that we find in Ortus Vocabulorum; " Cloto
. . . anglice, one of the thre wyrde systers" ed. 1514.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 106.
" As thick as tale,
Came post with post."
" The meaning is evident, when we take tale in the sense, not of
a narrative, but of an enumeration, from the Sax. telan, to count.
Johnson explains the passage correctly in these words : — ' Posts ar-
rived as fast as they could be counted.' Rowe read, ' as thick as hail,'
which may be considered a needless alteration of the text ; but it is
to be observed, nevertheless, that Southern, in his copy of the folio,
1685, the property of Mr. Holgate, made the same change in manu-
script." COLLIER.
I am strongly inclined to believe that "hail" is the right
reading: in the first place, because Johnson's explanation is
much less satisfactory to me than to Mr. Collier; secondly,
* See note, p. 158.
MACBETH. 189
because, though a compositor hardly ever mistakes t for h, he
sometimes mistakes T for H ; and in the first folio (as also in
the second) " tale" stands " Tale."
" Out of the towne come quarries thick as haile."
Drayton's Battaile of Agincourt, p. 20, ed. 1627.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 108.
" Macb. Give your favour : my dull brain was wrought
With things forgotten."
Read, with all the old and all the other modern editions,
" Give me your favour," &c.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 109.
" Dun. Is execution done on Cawdor ; or not
Those in commission yet return'd ?
Mai. My liege,
They are not yet come back," &c.
" The folio of 1632 alters ' or' into are, a change which all mo-
dern editors have adopted, but without sufficient reason. Duncan
asks whether execution has been done on Cawdor, or whether the
tidings had not yet been received by the return of those commis-
sioned for the purpose ? I owe this restoration to the Rev. Mr.
Barry." COLLIER.
Away with Mr. Barry's restoration! Could any boarding-
school girl read over the speech of Duncan, and not imme-
diately perceive from the arrangement of the words that " or"
is a misprint for " are " ?
SCENE 6. — C. p. 114.
" no jutty, frieze,
Buttress, nor coigne of vantage, but this bird
Hath made his pendent bed, and procreant cradle :
Where they most breed and haunt, I have observ'd,
The air is delicate."
" All the folios have ' must breed ;' and there the passage is thus
pointed : —
190 MACBETH.
' Where they must breed, and haunt : I have observ'd
The air is delicate.'
Rowe changed must to ' most,' and there is little doubt that it was
a misprint in the first folio, which the others implicitly followed.
Nevertheless, sense might be made out of the passage as it stands in
the old copies, supposing Banquo to mean only, that the swallows
must breed in their procreant cradles ; adding, in the words, ' the air
is delicate/ his accordance with Duncan's previous remark." COL-
LIER.
This is another instance (see my remark p. 125) of Mr.
Collier's unwillingness to reject a gross misprint without say-
ing something in its favour.
If " sense is to be made out of the passage as it stands in
the old copies," we must previously suppose that Shakespeare
intended Banquo to have very little, — who informs the king
" that the swallows must breed in their procreant cradles"!
SCENE 7.— C. p. 118; K. p. 17.
" Macb. If we should fail, —
Lady M. We fail?
But screw your courage to the sticking-place,
And we'll not fail."
"This is the punctuation of the folios, 1623, 1632, 1664, and
1685, and in this case, perhaps, we may take it as some evidence of
the ancient mode of delivering the two words ' We fail ?' interroga-
tively. Malone substituted a mark of admiration, ' We fail !' and
Steevens pursued the same course ; but it may be doubted by some
whether both these modes are not wrong, and that Lady Macbeth
means merely to follow up what her husband says, by stating the
result of failure, which, however, in the next line, she supposes im-
possible, if Macbeth be but resolute in his purpose." COLLIER.
Though Mr. Collier makes a distinction between Malone's
punctuation and his own, there is in reality no difference :
whether the words be pointed " We fail !" or " We fail?" (and
I much prefer the former method), they can only be under-
stood as an impatient and contemptuous repetition of Mac-
beth's " we fail,—"
Mr. Knight gives (what Mr. Collier mentions as perhaps
MACBETH. 191
the right mode of pointing the words), "We fail." He ob-
serves, " the quiet self-possession of the punctuation we have
adopted appears preferable to the original ' We fail ?' "
Steevens was (I believe) the first to suggest that the pro-
per punctuation might be, " We fail " : and he commences an
elaborate note by informing us that " * If we fail, we fail,'
is a colloquial phrase still infrequent use" — as if fail were
the only word so employed, and not any other verb in the
language according to the circumstances of the speaker ! This
form of expression seems to have been originally a Scriptural
one :
" If 1 be bereaved of my children, I am bereaved." Gen. xliii. 14.
" And so will I go in unto the king, which is not according to the
law: and if I perish, I perish." Esther iv. 16.
Any kind of admission on the part of Lady Macbeth that
the attempt might prove unsuccessful, appears to me quite
inconsistent with all that she has previously said, and all that
she afterwards says, in the present scene. She hastily inter-
rupts her husband, checking the very idea of failure as it
rises in his mind.
I recollect, indeed, hearing Mrs. Siddons deliver the words
as if (to use Mr. Collier's expression) she was "stating the
result of failure ;" but there can be no doubt that she had
adopted that manner of delivery in consequence of Steevens's
note. Nor was this the only passage of Shakespeare in which
that incomparable actress refined on the simple meaning of
the text (witness her celebrated
" Lord cardinal, —
To you I speak,"
in Henry Fill.), while the more critical portion of the au-
dience overlooked the subtlety in the consummate skill of the
execution.
192 MACBETH.
ACT II.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 122; K. p. 24.
" thus with his stealthy pace,
With Tarquin's ravishing strides, towards his design
Moves like a ghost."
" The folios have sides, out of which it is not easy to extract
sense," &c. COLLIER.
Mr. Knight retains " sides" in the text ! ! — mentions, in a
note, that Tieck considers the word to be used here for " the
seat of the passions" (which, however, he has some doubt of,
though he does not reject the opinion /), — and concludes his
observations on the passage by proposing a villanous reading
of his own.
That Tieck, a man of fine genius, can fully enter into the
spirit of Shakespeare's works, is not to be doubted for a
moment : but that he (as every foreigner must be, who has not
spent many years in this country, conversing daily with the
natives) is utterly incompetent to write verbal criticism on the
meanest, far less on the greatest of English poets, is most
clearly shewn by every one of those remarks on the present
play which Mr. Knight has transplanted into his notes.
The passage last cited is immediately followed by,
" Thou sure and firm- set earth,
Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear
Thy very stones prate of my where-about," &c.
in which the old copies have " which they may walk," — and
Tieck defends the original reading, as " ungrammatical, singu-
lar, and perfectly dream-like."
In act i. sc. 3,
" The weird sisters"
is in the folio " The weyward sisters," — i. e. quoth Tieck,
" wayward — wilful."
In act i. sc. 5, where Lady Macbeth wishes to become un-
sexed,
" That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect and it,"
MACBETH. 198
the folio happens to spell the last word " hit," — " which Tieck
proposes to retain."
In act i. sc. 7, Macbeth says ;
" but that this blow
Might be the be-all and the end-all, here,
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,
We'd jump the life to come."
and the folio having " school," Tieck thinks it right : " bank
is here the school-bench ; time is used, as it frequently is, for
the present time," &c. &c.
In act iv. sc. 1, Macbeth conjures the Witches to answer
him,
" though the treasure
Of nature's germins tumble all together," &c.
here the folio has "germaine" (the s having dropt out), —
" which Tieck would retain . . . . ' nature's germaine* means
the sun and moon" (he might have added, " and the seven
stars").
Gifford was indignant at the follies of the bygone editors
of Shakespeare ; but what would he have felt, had he lived to
see one of the poet's greatest tragedies illustrated by an im-
portation of nonsense from Germany !
To return to " Tarquin's ravishing strides." — I have no
doubt that " strides" is the genuine reading : those critics who
objected that the word conveys an idea of violence, &c., ought
to have remembered that Shakespeare in an early poem had
described that very Tarquin as " stalking" into the chamber
of Lucretia ;
" Into the chamber wickedly he stalks,
And gazeth on her yet-unstained bed," &c.
Rape of Lucrece, vol. viii. 425.
" That summons thee to heaven or to hell. [Exit.
Scene II.
The Same."
(So all the other modern editions ; though there is no change
of place.}
o
194 MACBETH.
" Enter Lady MACBETH.
Lady M. That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold :
What hath quench'd them hath given me fire. — Hark ! — Peace !
It was the owl that shriek'd, the fatal bellman,
Which gives the stern'st good-night. He is about it.
The doors are open ; and the surfeited grooms
Do mock their charge with snores : I have drugg'd their possets,
That death and nature do contend about them,
Whether they live, or die."
Mr. Knight prints the speech of Lady Macbeth thus ;
" That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold :
What hath quench'd them hath given me fire : —
Hark ! Peace ! It was the owl that shriek'd,
The fatal bellman which gives the stern'st good night.
He is about it : The doors are open ;
And the surfeited grooms do mock their charge with snores :
I have drugg'd their possets,
That death and nature do contend about them,
Whether they live, or die."
" Here [' He is about it,' &c.]," says Mr. Knight, " we
follow the metrical arrangement of the original, with a slight
deviation in the subsequent lines."
In not a few passages of Shakespeare the metrical arrange-
ment of the old editions was most wantonly altered by Steevens
and Malone. But there are some passages, — and the present
speech is one of them, — where a new division of the lines is
obviously necessary. The regulation given here by Mr. Knight
is not "metrical," — it is barbarous. Let any one write out
the passage as prose, and then read it as verse, — it will natu-
rally fall into the arrangement which Mr. Collier has adopted.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 126.
" A little water clears us of this deed :
How easy is it, then 9"
Wrong punctuation. She is not asking what the facility
is ; but exclaiming at it, — " How easy is it, then ! "
MACBETH. 195
SCENE 4.— C. p. 132.
" Ah ! good father,
Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
Threaten his bloody stage : by the clock 'tis day,
And yet dark night strangles the travailing lamp.
Is't night's predominance, or the day's shame,
That darkness does the face of earth entomb,
When living light should kiss it ?"
" The words travel and travail (observes the Rev. Mr. Barry)
have now different meanings, though formerly synonymous. Travel-
ling, the ordinary reading, gives a puerile idea ; whereas the poet, by
' travailing/ seems to have reference to the struggle between the sun
and night, which induces Rosse to ask,
' Is't night's predominance, or the day's shame,' " £c.
COLLIER.
The stupidity of Mr. Barry's alteration is intolerable, and
Mr. Collier's rashness in adopting it extreme. In this speech
no mention is made of the sun till it is described as " the
travelling lamp," — the epithet " travelling" determining what
"lamp" was intended: the instant, therefore, that "travel-
ling' is changed to " travailing," the word " lamp" CEASES TO
SIGNIFY THE SUN.
That Shakespeare was not singular in applying the epithet
travelling to the sun might be shewn by many passages of our
early poets : so Drayton ;
" The Sunne that mounted the sterne Lions back,
Shall with the Fishes shortly diue the Brack,
But still you keepe your station, which confines
You, nor regard him trauelling the signes."
On his Ladies not Camming to London, — Elegies, p. 185,
appended to The Battaile of Agincourt, &c. 1627.
Even modern writers describe the sun as a traveller;
" I could not but offer up, in silence, on the altar of my heart,
praise and adoration to that sovereign and universal mind, who pro-
duced this glorious creature [the sun], as the bright image of his
benignity, and makes it travel unweariedly round," &c. Amory's
Life ofBunde, vol.ii. 178, ed. 1766.
It is hardly necessary to add, tbat this " puerile idea," as
the Rev. Mr. Barry terms it, is to be traced to Scripture, —
Psalm xix. 5.
196 MACBETH.
ACT III.
SCENE l.—C. p. 136.
" To make them kings, the seeds of Banquo kings !"
" So the old copies, which there is no sufficient reason for aban-
doning, especially as Macbeth is speaking of Banquo 's issue through-
out in the plural." COLLIER.
But does not f seed' convey the idea of number as well as
seeds ? and is it likely that Shakespeare would have deviated
so oddly from common phraseology as to term the issue of a
man his seeds ?
SCENE 2.— C. p. 140.
" Macb. We have scotch'd the snake, not kill'd it :
She'll close, and be herself, whilst our poor malice
Remains in danger of her former tooth.
But let the frame of things disjoint,
Both the worlds suffer,
Ere we will eat our meal in fear, and sleep
In the affliction of these terrible dreams,
That shake us nightly."
Print, as one line,
" But let the frame of things disjoint, both the worlds suffer."
SCENE 4. — C. p. 144.
" Lady M. My royal lord,
You do not give the cheer : the feast is sold,
That is not often vouch'd while 'tis a making ;
'Tis given with welcome"
The above punctuation is directly against the obvious mean-
ing of the passage, which ought to stand thus ;
" the feast is sold,
That is not often vouch'd, while 'tis a making,
'Tis given with welcome ;"
i. e. ' That feast can only be considered as sold, not given,
during which the entertainers omit such courtesies as may
assure their guests that it is given with welcome.'
MACBETH. 197
SCKNE 4.— C. p. 146 ; K. p. 37.
" Give me some wine : fill full. —
Re-enter Ghost.
I drink to the general joy of the whole table,
And to our dear friend Banquo," &c.
" It was the opinion of the late Mr. Benjamin Strutt that the
Ghost which entered at this point was that of Duncan, and not of
Banquo. The folio, 1623, certainly, does not mention whose Ghost
made its appearance, but the immediate context, referring again to
the absence of Banquo, seems to warrant the ordinary interpretation.
Had it been the Ghost of Duncan, the old copies would hardly have
failed to give us the information. It merely here states, 'Enter
Ghost,' having before stated, ' Enter the Ghost of Banquo.' Mr. H.
C. Robinson, in communicating to me Mr, B. Strutt's notion, sup-
ports it by several later portions of the scene, particularly by the pas-
sages, ' Thy bones are marrowless,' ' Thou hast no speculation in
those eyes,' and, ' Take any shape but that ;' which are supposed to
be applicable to Duncan, who had been long dead, and not to Banquo,
who had been very recently murdered. This opinion deserves to be
treated with every respect, but it seems rather one of those conjec-
tures in which original minds indulge, than a criticism founded upon
a correct interpretation of the text of the author. Macbeth would
not address ' And dare me to the desert with thy sword' to the shade
of the venerable Duncan ; and ' Thou hast no speculation in those
eyes/ &c. is the appearance that eyes would assume just after death.
Some have maintained, against the positive evidence of all the old
copies, that the first Ghost was that of Duncan." COLLIER.
Instead of agreeing with Mr. Collier that Strutt's " opi-
nion deserves to be treated with every respect," I am arrogant
enough to think that it is worthy of all contempt. In the first
place, it is certain that the stage-directions which are found
in the early editions of plays were designed solely for the
instruction of the actors, not for the benefit of the readers
(though Mr. Collier in the above note talks of the old copies
"giving us the information"); and consequently, if Shake-
speare had intended the Ghost of Duncan to appear as well
as the Ghost of Banquo, he would no doubt have carefully
distinguished them in the stage- directions, and not have risked
the possibility of the wrong Ghost being sent on by the
198 MACBETH.
prompter. Secondly, it is certain that when Dr. Simon Forman
saw Macbeth acted at the Globe in 1610, the Ghost of Dun-
can did not appear ; for he has left the following minute de-
scription of what occurred at the banquet ;
" The night, being at supper with his noblemen, whom he had
bid to a feast, (to the which also Banquo should have come,) he
began to speak of noble Banquo, and to wish that he were there.
And as he thus did, standing up to drink a carouse to him, the ghost of
Banquo came, and sat down in his chair behind him. And he, turning
about to sit down again, saw the ghost of Banquo, which fronted him,
so that he fell in a great passion of fear and fury, uttering many
words about his murder, by which, when they heard that Banquo
was murdered, they suspected Macbeth." (See Mr. Collier's Introd.
to the present play, p. 95.)
Mr. Knight, who gives a long Excursus on the Ghosts
(partly by a correspondent and partly by himself), and who
confesses that he is strongly inclined towards the opinion that
the second spectre is that of Duncan, observes, " To make
the ghost of Banquo return a second time at the moment
when Macbeth wishes for the presence of Banquo is not in
the highest style of art." I cannot help thinking that the
introduction of two ghosts would have been less artistic than
bringing back the ghost of Banquo: we have, indeed, in
Richard III. (act v. sc. 3) eleven ghosts on the stage at once ;
but there is a vast difference between ghosts walking in and
out of a banqueting-hall crowded with company, and ghosts
standing, in the dead of night, before the tents of two sleep-
ing princes.
If Shakespeare had brought in the ghost of Banquo a third
time, and had also made the murder of Lady Macduff precede
the banquet, — no doubt some ingenious gentleman would have
come forward to prove that the third ghost was Lady Mac-
dujfs.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 147 ; K. p. 37.
" or, be alive again,
And dare me to the desert with thy sword ;
If trembling 1 inhabit, then protest me
The baby of a girl."
MACBETH. 199
" This passage has occasioned much dispute ; and supposing the
arguments equally balanced, we should prefer the reading of all the
old copies. Malone would alter ' inhabit then,' to inhibit tliee, or
forbid thee, which was the meaning of inhibit : according to what we
think the true reading, Macbeth means to say, that he will not refuse
to meet the Ghost in the desert." COLLIER.
Here Mr. Collier has followed the punctuation of the later
folios, without mentioning that of the first folio ; he has not
stated by whom the original reading was altered ; nor is it
possible to discover from his note the precise meaning which
he attaches to " inhabit."
In the first folio, the line stands thus ;
" If trembling I inhabit then, protest mee."
and so it is printed by Mr. Knight. Pope altered " inhabit "
to "inhibit," and Steevens "then" to "thee;" both which
changes were adopted by Malone, who observes that the cor-
rection of Steevens is strongly supported by the punctuation
of the first folio.
Mr. Knight is mistaken in stating that " Horn Tooke
was the first to denounce this alteration :" Tooke merely
repeats what Henley had said in defence of " inhabit," i. e.
' remain within doors.'
For my own part, though I think Nares was rather bold
in pronouncing the old reading to be " evident nonsense "
(Gloss, in v.), I must yet entertain strong doubts whether
" inhabit " can be right ; and the more so, because Malone has
adduced two passages (one of them from Shakespeare) where
" inhabited" is unquestionably an error of the press for "in-
hibited."
SCENE 6.— C. p. 151.
" Len. Sent he to Macduff ?
Lord. He did : and with an absolute, ' Sir, not //
The cloudy messenger turns me his back,
And hums, as who should say, ' You'll rue the time
That clogs me with this answer.' "
The semi-colon placed after " Sir, not I," destroys the
meaning of the passage. The construction is: — "and the
200 MACBETH.
cloudy messenger turns me his back with an absolute ' Sir,
not I' [received in answer from Macduff], and hums, as who
should say," &c.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 153.
" Enter HECATE, and other Witches."
" The old stage -direction is, ' Enter Hecate, and the other three
Witches/ What ' other three Witches' are intended does not ap-
pear : perhaps we ought to read only, ' Enter Hecate, and other three
Witches/ " &c. COLLIER.
"What 'other three Witches' are intended" is plain
enough, — the three who now enter for the first time, there
being already three on the stage : the number of Witches in
this scene is six.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 156.
" A show of eight Kings, and BANQUO last, with a Glass in his Hand."
" Such is the old stage- direction, which, being complete in itself,
and applicable to what follows, there is no sufficient reason for alter-
ing, as has been done in the modern editions." COLLIER.
" Applicable to what follows" ! ! It makes Banquo bear a
glass in his hand; while, on the contrary, Macbeth exclaims,
that he sees the eighth King bearing it, and Banquo coming
after him;
" I'll see no more : —
And yet the eighth appears, who bears a glass,
Which shows me many more ; and some I see,
That two-fold balls and treble sceptres carry.
Horrible sight! — Now, I see, 'tis true;
For the blood-bolter d Banquo smiles upon me,
And points at them for his."
Had Mr. Collier really read this speech, when he sent his
note to press ?
SCENE 2.— C. p. 161 ; K. p. 45.
" Thou liest, thou shag-ear'd villain."
MACBETH. 201
Here Mr. Collier has no note.
Mr. Knight remarks, " This should be probably shay-
hair d." Assuredly it should : formerly, hair was often writ-
ten hear (see p. 95) ; and " ^a^-heared" was doubtless altered
by a mistake of the transcriber, or the original compositor,
to "sAo<7-ear'd." King Midas, after his decision in favour
of Pan, is the only human being on record to whom the
latter epithet could be applied.
ACT v.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 177; K. p. 54.
" What rhubarb, senna, or what purgative drug," &c.
Mr. Knight says, " We are not sure about this word. The
original reads cyme." But he may rest satisfied that " senna"
is right: the long list of drugs in The Rates of Marchandizesy
&c. furnishes no other word for which cyme could possibly be
a misprint.
SCENE 5. — C. p. 180.
" Mess. Gracious my lord,
I shall report that which I say I saw,
But know not how to do't."
A reading caught from Malone's last ed. (found also in
Shakespeare, 1803). All the old copies have,
" I should report that," &c.
" The wood began to move."
" So in Deloney's ballad in praise of Kentishmen, published i.»
' Strange Histories,' 1607, (reprinted by the Percy Society) they
conceal their numbers by the boughs of trees : —
' For when they spied his approach,
in place as they did stand,
Then marched they to hem him in,
each one a bough in hand.
' So that unto the Conqueror's sight,
amazed as he stood,
MACBETH.
They seemed to be a walking grove,
or els a mooving wood.' P. 7.
This ballad was written, unquestionably, before the year 1600." COL-
LIER.
As far as regards the illustration of Shakespeare's text, the
above note is nothing more to the purpose than those notes,
containing parallel passages from Pope's Homer, &c., which
were so unmercifully piled up by some of the commentators.
Had Shakespeare an eye to Deloney 's trumpery ballad when
he wrote the present scene ? Certainly not : we know that
he derived the circumstance of " the wood" from Holinshed.
Nor did Deloney (as Mr. Collier seems to suppose) invent the
incident in question : it forms a portion of William the Con-
queror's history, and is narrated in all the early accounts of
that monarch ; moreover, it was versified by Deloney from the
following passage of that very Holinshed who supplied Shake-
speare with the materials for Macbeth.
" Now, bicause it cannot hurt to take great heed, and to be verie
warie in such cases, they [the Kentishmen] agreed before hand, that
when the duke was come, and the passages on euerie side stopped, to
the end he should no waie be able to escape, euerie one of them, as
well horssemen as footmen should beare boughes in their hands. The
next daie after, when the duke was come into the fields and terri-
tories neere vnto Swanescombe, and saw all the countrie set and
placed about him as it had beene a stirring and mooning wood, and
that with a meane pace they approched and drew neare vnto him,
with great discomfort of mind he woondered at that sight." Chron.
vol. iii. p. 2, ed. 1587.
Concerning this notorious legend, on the line
" First, in the Kentish Stremer was a Wood,"
Dray ton puts a marginal note,
" Expressing their freedom, as still retaining their ancient liber-
ties, by surprizing the Conqueror like a moouing Wood." The Bat-
taile of Agincourt, p. 14. ed. 1627.
SCENE 7.— C. p. 183.
I cannot strike at wretched kernes, whose arms
Are hir'd to bear their staves."
MACBETH. 203
" The word " kernes" seems here used with greater licence than
usual, as mercenaries. See vol. v. p. 161." COLLIER.
This remark appears to have been suggested to Mr. Col-
lier by the words which immediately follow " kernes," — words
which, according to his interpretation of " kernes," would be
superfluous.
204
HAMLET.
[Vol. vii. COLLIER; vol. viii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 200; K. p. 30.
" A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye."
Here Mr. Knight (like Caldecott) very injudiciously pre-
'' fers the reading of the first quarto, " moth," — which is merely
the old spelling of mote ! — yet, with the greatest inconsistency,
he prints in King John, act iv. sc. 2 ;
" Hub. None, but to lose your eyes.
Arth. O heaven ! — that there were but a mote in yours," &c.
where all the old editions have " moth."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 206.
" To do obsequious sorrow : but to persevere
In obstinate condolement," &c.
On the passage of The Virgin-Martyr,
" Harp. My best lady,
Per sever in it,"
Gifford observes, " So this word was anciently written and
pronounced : thus the King in Hamlet;
' but to pers^ver
In obstinate condolement,' " &c.
Massinger's Works, i. 7, ed. 1813.
Hear, too, Mr. Collier himself, who on the line in the Two
Gentlemen of Verona, act iii. sc. 2, (vol. i. 141),
" Ay, and perversely shepersevers so,"
remarks, " This was the old mode of accenting the word, as
many instances might be produced to establish."
HAMLET. 205
SCENE 2.— C. p. 207.
" and yet, within a month, —
Let me not think on't. — Frailty, thy name is woman ! —
A little month," &c.
Why a full-point after "on't"? The sense runs on from
" within a month" to " A little month."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 209 ; K. p. 39.
" Ham. Saw ! who ?"
These words, after being wrongly pointed in the quartos,
" Saw, who ?" and more erroneously in the folios, " Saw ?
Who?" have at length been embellished by the modern editors
with both an exclamation and an interrogation-point. The
right punctuation is doubtless " Saw who?" (i. e. whom) ; nor
do I recollect any performer of Hamlet who understood the
words but as a single question : no pause of astonishment was
made between " Saw" and " who" by the two Kembles, Kean,
and Young, — none is made by Macready and the younger
Kean.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 212; K. p. 4!.
" If you have hitherto conceal'd this sight,
Let it be tenable in your silence still."
Mr. Knight gives the misprint of the folio, " treble," as
had already been done by Caldecott, from whose edition he has
borrowed the explanation, " Hamlet imposes a threefold obli-
gation of silence ;" but has very prudently forborne to quote the
parallel passages which are there adduced, — for, except that
they happen to contain the words " treble," " thirds," and
" thrice," they bear not the most distant resemblance to the
monstrous expression, " Let it be treble in your silence."
SCENE 3.— C. p. 215 ; K. p. 44.
" Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not express'd in fancy ; rich, not gaudy :
For the apparel oft proclaims the man ;
206 HAMLET.
And they in France, of the best rank and station,
Are of a most select and generous chief in that"
" The meaning perhaps is* ' Are of a most select and generous
rank and station, chiefly in that.' Malone, however, thought that
' chief might here be used as in heraldry." COLLIER.
" So stands the line in the folio, and in the quartos, including
that of 1603. ' Of a' has been rejected by all the editors, except
Malone, who deems chief, chief e, or chefft to be a substantive, having
a meaning derived from heraldry. It is scarcely necessary to go to
heraldry for an explanation of the word : we have it in composition,
as in mischief, and the now obsolete bonchief. Chef, literally the
head, here signifies eminence, superiority. Those of the best rank
and station are of a most select and generous superiority in the indi-
cation of their dignity by their apparel." KNIGHT.
If it were not equally certain that " Malone's knowledge
of our ancient language was very limited, even at the end
of his career" (GifFord's note on Ford's Works, i. 90) ; that
Mr. Collier has read our early dramatic literature rather as a
searcher after facts than as a philologist ; and that Mr. Knight
has come but recently to the study of old English writers, —
there would be cause for utter astonishment that they should
have attempted to defend the original reading here, and not
have perceived at once that " of a" was as much an injury to
the sense as they must have acknowledged that it was to the
metre.
Though Mr. Collier rightly understands " chief in that" as
" chiefly in that" (and the words can be used here in no other
sense), his note, nevertheless, is quite as objectionable as any
which has been written on this passage: when he explained
" of a most select and generous" to mean " of a most select and
generous rank and station" — botching up a sense by supply-
ing " rank and station" from the preceding line, — did he
seriously believe that such an ellipsis was allowable in the
language of a civilised nation ?
During the many hours which I have spent (perhaps wasted)
in collating early dramas, I have known four or five editions
of a play, though differing from each other materially else-
where, yet coincide in some one most erroneous reading
(which was corrected by a fortunately extant MS.) : the text
HAMLET. 207
of that particular place having been once vitiated, the corruption
had been retained in all the subsequent impressions. Such is
evidently the case here (where there is unluckily no MS. Hamlet
to refer to) ; and the probability seems to be, that the strangely
impertinent words " of a " found their way into the line, while
the eye of the transcriber or compositor, glancing away from
it for a moment, was arrested by " of the" immediately above.
Let me dismiss this locus impeditus with an earnest hope that
the next editor of Shakespeare will give,
" Are most select and generous, chief in that," —
mentioning in a note, but without the slightest comment, the
original reading.
At the conclusion of the present speech, Mr. Knight ob-
serves ;
" It has been objected to these maxims of Polonius that their
good sense ill accords with his general character, his tediousness, his
babbling vanity. It is remarkable that in. the quarto of 1603, the
' precepts' are printed with inverted commas, as if they were taken
from some known source ; or, at any rate, as if Polonius had delivered
them by an effort of memory alone."
Not at all "remarkable." In the quartos of the present
play (excepting that of 1603) a speech of the Queen, act iv.
sc. 5, is "printed with inverted commas :" I now cite it from
4to, 1605;
' To my sicke soule, as sinnes true nature is,
' Each toy seemes prologue to some great amisse,
' So full of artlesse iealousie is guilt,
' It spills it selfe, in fearing to be spylt.
(the 4 to of 1637 gives it with double commas.)
In various other early plays, THE GNOMIC PORTIONS ar
so distinguished : for instance, in Marston's Malcontent, 1604,
where, among several longer passages printed with inverted
commas, the following occur ;
Mend. Thou rise ?
Mai. I, at the resurrection.
" No vulgar seede, but once may rise, and shall,
" No King so huge, but fore he die, may fall."
Sig. B 4 (c ed. of the same date, with additions).
208 HAMLET.
This both the liuing and the dead offends,
" Sharpe surgery where nought but death amends."
Sig. D (D 2).
Mend. Why, we are both but dead, the Duke hates us,
" And those whome Princes doe once groundly hate,
" Let them prouide to dye, as sure as fate :
" Preuention is the hart of pollicie."
Sig. D 3 (D 4).
Nor was this custom of marking maxims by inverted commas
confined to dramatic pieces only: in Watson's EKATOMTIA-
SIA, or Passionate Centurie of Loue, n. d., we find ;
And yet I coulde, if sorrowe woulde permit,
Tell when and howe I fix't my fancie first,
And for whose sake I lost both will and wit,
And choase the path, wherein I Hue accurst :
But such like deedes would breed a double soare,
" For loue gainesaide growes madder then before.
But note herewith, that so my thoughts are bound, &c.
Son. xxxviii.
Then peerelesse Dame, the grounde of all my griefe,
Voutsafe to cure the cause of my complainte :
No fauoure els but thine can yeelde reliefe.
But helpe in time, before I further fainte,
" For Daunger growes by lingringe till the last,
" And phisick hath no helpe, when life is past.
Son. lix.
and in Dray ton's Barons Warres ;
And they which could the Complements of state,
To Greatnesse gaue each Ceremonious Rite,
To their Designes to giue the longer date,
The like againe in others to excite ;
In entertaining Loue, they welcom'd Hate,
And to one Banquet freely both inuite ;
" A Princes Wealth by spending still doth spred,
" Like to a Brooke by many Fount aines fed.
Canto vi. st. 14.
As Fortune meant, her Power on March to show,
And in her Armes to beare him through the Skye,
By him to daunt whos'euer sat below,
Hauing aboue them mounted him so hye :
HAMLET. 209
Who at his beck was he that did not bow,
If at his feet he did not humbly lye ?
" All things concurre with more then happy Chance,
" To rayse the Man whom Fortune will aduance.
St. 17. ed. folio.
(Both stanzas are very different in the earlier eds.)
SCENE 3. — C. p. 217.
" I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth,
Have you so slander any moment leisure,
As to give words," &c.
" i. e. any leisure moment. The old copies, quarto and folio, are
uniform in this text, and the modern editors uniform in varying from
it. At the same time it is to be admitted, that ' any moment's lei-
sure' would not be objectionable, if change were required." COLLIER.
It is absolutely necessary to print " moment's." Would
Shakespeare have employed such a ridiculous inversion, when
" leisure moment" suited the metre as well ?
SCENE 4.— C. p. 218 ; K. p. 46.
" Ham. The air bites shrewdly ; it is very cold."
Mr. Knight chooses to adopt from the folio, "Is it very
cold ?" — a reading which would greatly favour the opinion of
those critics who contend that the madness of Hamlet was
real, not assumed ; for no man in his sound senses, just after
remarking that the air bites shrewdly, would inquire if it were
very cold.
" The king doth wake to-night, and takes his rouse," &c.
Caldecott is the only commentator who has a note on
" wake ;"
" This term," he says, " probably here imports more than simply
vigilice, and must have reference to such festivities as were used on
the opening, consecration, or wake-day of our churches ; ' encaenia
templorum, in quibus noctem ssepe choreis perviligem ducunt bac-
chantes.' Skinn.," &c.
p
210 HAMLET.
In the present passage, "wake" evidently means * hold a
late revel.' So, in poets of a much earlier date, we find the
words watch and watching employed as equivalent to * debauch
at night ;'
" Hatefull of harte he was to sobernes,
Cherishyng surfetes, watche and glotony," &c.
Lydgate's Faff of "Pry noes, b. ii. fol. L. ed. Wayland.
" Withdraw your hand fro riotous watchyng."
Id. b. ix. fol. xxxi.
" His hede was heuy for watchynge ouer nyghte."
Skelton's Bowge of Courte, — Works, i. 43, ed. Dyce.
So also in a tract of later date than the present play ;
" Late watchings in Tauerns will wrinckle that face." The Wan-
dering Jew, 1640, sig. D.
" a custom
More honour'd in the breach, than the observance."
I once heard an eminent poet maintain that this passage,
though it has passed into a sort of proverbial expression, is
essentially nonsense : " how," said he, " can a custom be hon-
oured in the breach?" — Compare the following line of a play
attributed to Jonson, Fletcher, and Middleton ;
" He keeps his promise best that breaks with hell."
The Widow, act iii. sc. 2.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 225 ; K p. 52.
" And with a sudden vigour it doth posset,
And curd, like eager droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood : so did it mine ;
And a most instant tetter bark'd about,
Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
All my smooth body."
Mr. Knight prints " aigre," and tells us ;
" The word is certainly used in a technical sense in the folio.
It is spelt with a capital, Aygre; while eager in the common sense
of sharp, in the passage,
' It is a nipping and an eager air,'
has the familiar orthography."
HAMLET.
This distinction between aygre and eager (like that be-
tween boson and boatswain, and that between stayers and
staires,- see pp. 1, 56) exists only in Mr. Knight's imagina-
tion : in the then uncertain state of orthography there was
no end to the variations in the spelling of words. On the
authority of the folio too, Mr. Knight gives in the fourth
line of this passage, " bak'd," — a glaring misprint.
ACT III.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 259.
" For we have closely sent for Hamlet hither,
That he, as 'twere by accident, may here
Affront Ophelia : her father, and my self (lawful espials)
Will so bestow ourselves, that, seeing, unseen,
We may of their encounter frankly judge," &c.
Arrange, by all means, with the other modern editors ;
" That he, as 'twere by accident, may here
Affront Ophelia :
Her father and myself (lawful espials)
Will so," &c.
(Just above we find ;
" With all my heart ; and it doth much content me
To hear him so inclin'd.
Good gentlemen, give him a farther edge,
And drive his purpose on to these delights."
why did not Mr. Collier, for the sake of consistency, print as
a single line of seventeen syllables^
" With all my heart; and it doth much content me to hear him so inclin'd.
Good gentlemen," &c. ?)
In the following page Mr. Collier adopts a different system,
chopping up a line (as Malone does) for the sake of making
the metre run on regularly from the one speech to the next, —
though it is evident (not only from other places of the present
scene, but from innumerable passages throughout his dramas)
that Shakespeare was not at all solicitous about observing
such a <rvvd<f)6ia ;
HAMLET.
" that, with devotion's visage,
And pious action, we do sugar o'er
The devil himself.
King. O ! 'tis too true : \_Aside.~] how smart
A lash that speech doth give my conscience !"
The old metrical regulation (as Mr. Knight saw) is the right
one ;
" The devil himself.
King. O 'tis too true !
How smart a lash that speech doth give my conscience f"
SCENE 1.— C. p. 261 ; K. p. 88.
" And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action."
Mr. Knight gives, with the folio, "away," — which is no-
thing more than a typographical error for " awry." In Antony
and Cleopatra, act v. sc. 2, all the old copies have,
" Your crown's away ;
I'll mend it, and then play."
where Pope corrected (and Mr. Knight prints) " awry." In
Beaumont and Fletcher's Knight of Malta, act iv. sc. 2, the
second folio has,
" Mir. Ha! — to your prayers !
Nor. 'Twas hereabouts ; 'thas put me clean away now."
where the first folio gives correctly " awry :" and in their Cap-
tain, act iii. sc. 3, both the folios have,
" Clora. Come, be friends ;
The soldier is a Mars : no more ; we are all
Subject to slide away."
where the right reading is obviously " awry."
SCENE 1.— C. p. 263 ; K. p. 90.
" I have heard of your paintings too, well enough : God hath
given you one face, and you make yourselves another : you jig, you
amble, and you lisp, and nickname God's creatures, and make your
wantonness your ignorance."
HAMLET. 213
Mr. Knight gives the passage thus ;
" I have heard of your prattlings too, well enough. God hath
given you one pace, and you make yourselves another; you jig, you
amble, and you lisp, and nick-name God's creatures, and make your
wantonness your ignorance."
and with the following note ;
" Such is the reading of the folio. In the quartos, which have
supplied the received text, we have paintings instead of prattlings, and
face instead of pace. The context justifies the change of the folio.
' You jig and you amble' — you go trippingly and mincingly in your
gait — (as the daughters of Sion are said, in Isaiah, to ' come in trip-
ping so nicely with their feet') — refers to pace ; as, ' you lisp and you
nick-name God's creatures,' does to prattlings. The face-painting,
although a vice of Shakspere's day, would, according to the read-
ing of the quarto, be disconnected from the second member of the
sentence."
That the reading of the folio is mere nonsense and con-
fusion, Mr. Knight has shewn by his attempt to explain it, —
by making the words "you lisp and nickname God's crea-
tures" refer to " prattlings" in the earliest portion of the speech,
while " you jig, you amble," which precede those words, are
made to refer to " pace," standing later in the speech than
" prattlings" ! And that the quartos exhibit the right read-
ing, we have a confirmation in the earliest of them all, that
of 1603, where the passage stands thus;
" Nay, I haue heard of jour paintings too,
God hath giuen you one face,
And you make your selues another," &c.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 268; K. p. 93.
" Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice,
And could of men distinguish, her election
Hath seal'd thee for herself."
No commentator has observed, that a passage, which may
have suggested the above, occurs in The Case is altered, act i.
sc. 2;
" Dear Angelo, you are not every man,
HAMLET.
But one, whom my election hath design'd
As the true proper object of my soul."
Whether The Case is altered was written by Jonson or not
(and, for my own part, I believe it to be his), we are at least
certain that it was produced before 1599, as it is familiarly
mentioned in Nash's Lenten Stuff, which appeared during that
year.
" There is a play to-night before the king ;
One scene of it comes near the circumstance,
Which I have told thee, of my father's death :
I pr'ythee, when thou seest that act a-foot,
Even with the very comment of my soul
Observe mine uncle : if his occulted guilt
Do not itself unkennel in one speech,
It is a damned ghost that we have seen,
And my imaginations are as foul
As Vulcan's stithy. Give him heedful note ;
For I mine eyes will rivet to his face,
And, after, we will both our judgments join
In censure of his seeming."
" So the folio, for * thy soul' of the quartos. Hamlet is putting
Horatio in his place, for the purpose of watching the king, for though
he intends to rivet his eyes on the face of the king, he must appear
to be ' idle' — ' I must be idle : get you a place,' are the words Ham-
let afterwards employs." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight also prints "my;" and remarks;
" Hamlet, having told Horatio the ' circumstance' of his father's
death, and imparted his suspicions of his uncle, entreats his friend to
observe his uncle 'with the very comment of my soul,' — Hamlet's
soul. To ask Horatio to observe him with the comment of his own
soul (Horatio's), is a mere feeble expletive."
Mr. Collier has in so many other places of this play rejected
the readings of the folio as decidedly erroneous, that I am the
more surprised at his retaining the misprint " my" in the pre-
sent passage. For Mr. Knight to adopt it, was only consistent
with the deference which he has elsewhere paid to the authority
of the folio in Hamlet, — of which tragedy his text is beyond
all doubt the worst that has appeared in modern times.
HAMLET. 215
Mr. Collier's explanation of the passage is self-contradic-
tory. It would have been all very well for Hamlet to have
" put Horatio in his place for the purpose of watching the
king," if he himself had been unable, or had not intended, to
do so ; but, on the contrary, he expressly declares that he
" will rivet his eyes to the face of his uncle." What Hamlet
afterwards says,
" They are coming to the play : / must be idle ;
Get you a place," —
has no sort of connexion with the present speech.
When Mr. Knight objects to the reading of the quartos,
" Even with the very comment of thy soul
Observe mine uncle,"
that " to ask Horatio to observe him with the comment of his
own soul (Horatio's), is a mere feeble expletive," he shews by
omitting all mention of the important word " very," that he
has totally misunderstood the passage. " The very comment
of thy soul" is (as Caldecott well interprets it) " the most
intense direction of every faculty ;" and Hamlet concludes the
speech by informing Horatio why he wished him to watch his
uncle with such close attention ;
" Give him heedful note ;
For I mine eyes will rivet to his face,
And, after, we will both our judgments join
In censure of his seeming."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 275.
" Ham Begin, murderer : leave thy damnable faces,
and begin. Come : — The croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.
Luc. Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing," &c.
" This [' The croaking raven doth bellow for revenge''] perhaps was
a quotation from some other play in Hamlet's memory : it does not
seem to belong to that under representation, for Lucianus does not
begin with it." COLLIER.
" Lucianus does not begin with it " ! no, truly ; one would
wonder if he did ; it would come rather oddly from his mouth.
Whether the words in question be cited from some other
HAMLET.
play or not, Hamlet seems to mean, * Begin without more de-
lay ; for the raven, prescient of the deed, is already croaking,
and, as it were, calling out for the revenge which will ensue.'
SCENE 2.— C. p. 279 ; K. p. 102.
" Ham. It is as easy as lying : govern these ventages with your
finger and thumb, give it breath with your mouth, and it will dis-
course most eloquent music. Look you, these are the stops.
Guil. But these cannot I command to any utterance of harmony :
I have not the skill.
Ham. Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of
me. You would play upon me ; you would seem to know my stops ;
you would pluck out the heart of my mystery ; you would sound me
from my lowest note to the top of my compass ; and there is much
music, excellent voice, in this little organ, yet cannot you make it
speak."
Mr. Knight gives the conclusion of the last speech thus ;
" and there is much music, excellent voice, hi this little
organ ; yet cannot you make it."
" So," he observes, " the folio ; in the quartos ' yet cannot you
make it speak.' The poet certainly meant to say, yet cannot you
make this music, this excellent voice. Guilderstern could have made
the pipe speak, but he could not command it to any utterance of
harmony. We believe that even in the quarto the passage has not
the meaning which we find in the modern text, but that it should be
printed, ' there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ,
yet cannot you make it. Speak !' " &c.
Here Mr. Knight defends the error of the folio with the
same dreadful subtlety which he has previously employed to
defend another of its errors in act ii. sc. 2, — the accidental
omission of the word " firmament" in the passage, " this brave
o'erhanging — this majestical roof fretted with golden fire,"
&c., where he labours to prove that " o'erhanging" is a sub-
stantive !
Can any thing possibly be plainer than that in the reading,
" yet cannot you make it speak," the word "speak" does not
mean ' give forth a sound,' but ' utter some of the " much
music, excellent voice," ' mentioned immediately before ? Be-
HAMLET. 217
sides "speak" in the present passage answers to "discourse"
in the preceding speech of Hamlet ; " govern these ventages
with your finger and thumb, give it breath with your mouth,
and it will discourse most eloquent music."
SCENE 3.— C. p. 284.
" A villain kills my father ; and for that,
I, his sole son, do this same villain send
To heaven."
"This is the reading of the quartos, 1604, &c. The folio has
'foul son,' which may be right." COLLIER.
The reading, " foul," is such a ludicrous misprint, that
Mr. Knight, who has adopted so many other errors of the
folio, did not venture even to mention it.
SCENE 4-.— C. p. 291.
" Queen. This is the very coinage of your brain :
This bodily creation ecstasy
Is very cunning in."
This new lection must, of course, be attributed to Mr. Col-
lier's printer. — Read "bodiless."
ACT IV.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 294.
" King. There's matter in these sighs : these profound heaves
You must translate ; 'tis fit we understand them."
This punctuation is quite against the sense. The proper
pointing is ;
" There's matter in these sighs, these profound heaves :
You must translate; 'tis fit we understand them."
SCENE 7.— C. p. 318 ; K. p. 135.
" For goodness, growing to a. pleurisy,
Dies in his own too-much."
What ! " goodness" with a laterum dolor !
218 HAMLET.
Read, with Malone and Mr. Knight, " plurisy" (from plus,
pluris). Pleurisy (from irKevplris) is a distinct word.
The present passage is imitated by Massinger in The Un-
natural Combat, act iv. sc. 1 ;
" Thy plurisy of goodness is thy ill;"
i. e.t Gifford observes, " thy superabundance of goodness."
ACT V.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 323.
" Go, get thee to Yaughan ; fetch me a stoop of liquor."
" It is just possible that ' Yaughan' was a mis-spelt stage-direc-
tion to inform the player that he was to yawn at this point." COL-
LIER.
If Martinus Scriblerus, instead of exercising his acuteness
on the text of Virgil, had employed it on that of Shakespeare,
he could hardly have offered a more felicitous conjecture than
this. A fastidious reader, however, may object — that in the
stage-directions of early dramas we find nothing of the kind, —
nothing about coughing, sneezing, hiccupping, &c.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 325 ; K. p. 146.
" A pick-axe, and a spade, a spade,
For and a shrouding sheet :
O ! a pit of clay for to be made
For such a guest is meet."
The break after " For," inserted by all the modern editors,
is quite wrong. "For and" in the present version of the
stanza, answers to " And eke" in that given by Percy (Rel. of
A. E. P. vol. i. 192, ed. 1812) ;
" And eke a shrowding shete."
Compare the following passages (to which many others might
be added) ;
" Syr Gy, Syr Gawen, Syr Cayus3/or and Syr Olyuere."
Skelton's Sec. Poem Against Garnesche, —
Works, i. 119, ed. Dyce.
HAMLET. 219
" Your squire doth, come, and with him comes the lady,
For and the Squire of Damsels, as I take it."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Knight of the Burning
Pestle, act ii. sc. 3.
(a passage with which the modern editors made sad work.)
" A hippocrene, a tweak, for and a fucus."
Middleton's Fair Quarrel, act v. sc. 1.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 328.
" 1 Clo This same scull, sir, this same scull, sir,
was Yorick's scull, the king's jester.
Ham. This ? [Takes the Scull.
1 Clo. E'en that.
Ham. Let me see. Alas, poor Yorick," &c.
When Mr. Collier inserted, from the folio, the words
"Let me see," he ought to have placed the stage-direction
" Takes the Scull" after them ; for it is very evident that while
Hamlet speaks these words, he has not yet taken the sculL
SCENE 2.— -C. p. 336 ; K. p. 155.
" But I am very sorry, good Horatio,
That to Laertes I forgot myself,
For by the image of my cause I see
The portraiture of his : I'll count his favours."
" Rowe reads court for ' count,' with considerable plausibility :
however, ' count' may be the word in the sense of count upon'1 COL-
LIER.
So also Messrs. Malone and Knight.
I have no doubt that Rowe gave what Shakespeare wrote.
Steevens's defence of " count " (in reply to M. Mason) is a
beautiful specimen of trifling.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 337 ; K. p. 156.
" Sir, his definement suffers no perdition in you ; though, I know,
to divide him inventorially, would dizzy the arithmetic of memory ;
and yet but raw neither, in respect of his quick sail."
220 HAMLET.
" The quarto of 1604 has yaw for ' raw,' which itself may be a
misprint : Warburton would read slow for ' raw.' " COLLIER.
Mr. Collier is the only editor who has noticed that the
j( I quarto of 1604 has "yaw;" and he ought at once to have
perceived from the context that it is the genuine reading.
Nothing, I think, can be more certain than that the passage
should stand thus ;
" though, I know, to divide him inventorially would dizzy the
arithmetic of memory, and it [which was often mistaken by our early
printers for " yet," perhaps because it was written " yt"] but yaw
neither in respect of his quick sail."
" To yaw (as a ship), hue illuc vacillare, capite nutare." Coles's
Diet.
The substantive " yaw" occurs in Massinger ;
" O, the yaws that she will make !
Look to your stern, dear mistress, and steer right,
Here's that will work as high as the Bay of Portugal."
Massinger's Very Woman, act Hi. sc. 5, —
Works, iv. 297, ed. 1813.
where GifFord remarks ;
" A yaw is that unsteady motion which a ship makes in a great
swell, when, in steering, she inclines to the right or left of her
course."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 340 ; K. p. 158.
" Thus has he (and many more of the same breed, that, I know,
the drossy age dotes on) only got the tune of the time, and outward
habit of encounter, a kind of yesty collection, which carries them
through and through the most fond and winnowed opinions ; and do but
blow them to their trial, the bubbles are out."
"The quarto, 1604, has 'the most prophane and trennowed
opinions,' and trennowed was altered in later quartos to trennowned,
which affords no better sense. Our reading is that of the folio."
COLLIER.
The common interpretation of the passage is (I use the
words of Caldecott), " which carries them (i. e. enables them
to pass current) through and through the most fond and win-
PIAMLET. 221
nowed opinions (/'. e. all judgments, not the simplest only, but
the most sifted and wisest)," &c.
Now, to suppose that " the most fond and winnowed opi-
nions" could mean " all judgments, NOT the simplest ONLY, BUT
the most sifted and wisest," is little short of insanity. The
admirable emendation of Warburton (which is not even men-
tioned by Messrs. Caldecott, Collier, and Knight !) evidently
restores the genuine reading, — "the most fand (fanned) and
winnowed opinions." That "fanned" and " winnowed" occur
together in other writers, and that Shakespeare has "the fan
and wind of your fair sword" in Troilus and Cressida (act v.
sc. 3), has been observed by Toilet.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 346.
" O God ! — Horatio, what a wounded name,
Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me ?"
Here Mr. Collier, like Malone, wrongly puts an interroga-
tion-point instead of an exclamation-point.
KING LEAR.
[Vol. vii. COLLIER; vol. ix. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 369 ; K. p. 30.
" Glo. Give me the letter, sir.
Edm. I shall offend, either to detain or give it.
The contents, as in part I understand them,
Are to blame."
This speech of Edmund is (like all the rest of the present
dialogue between him and his father) prose, and so given by
Messrs. Malone and Knight.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 371 ; K. p. 32.
" I would unstate myself to be in a due resolution."
"We should hardly have thought a note here necessary, if War-
burton, Johnson, Mason, and Steevens, had not disputed regarding
the meaning, which seems only to be, ' I would be content to sacri-
fice my rank, if I could but arrive at a thorough conviction as to his
design/ " COLLIER.
Mr. Collier's explanation is no doubt the right one, except
that instead of "my rank" he should have said "my state"
(i. e. both my rank and fortune).
Mr. Knight gives the various interpretations of this pas-
sage by Steevens, &c. without stating his own opinion, and
concludes his note by observing that " Tieck [again! see
p. 192] inclines to Johnson's explanation," — which is the
most flagrantly wrong of all.
SCENES.— C. p. 375; K. p. 35.
" Now, by my life,
Old fools are babes again ; and must be us'd
With checks ; as flatteries, when they are seen, abus'd."
Mr. Collier's punctuation of the last line is most erroneous.
Messrs. Malone and Knight give it rightly, thus ;
KING LEAR.
"With checks as flatteries, — when they are seen abus'd," —
as" meaning ' as well as.'
SCENE 4.— C. p. 375.
" Kent. If but as well I other accents borrow,
That can my speech diffuse," &c.
" So all the old editions : to ' diffuse* meant, in the time of
Shakespeare, to disorder or confuse : ' diffus'd attire' is an expression
in ' Henry V.' (Vol. v. p. 556) for disordered dress. A ' diffus'd
song' in 'The Merry Wives of Windsor,' A. iv. sc. 4, is an irregular
song. Toilet quoted the following apposite passage from Stow's
Chronicle, ' I doubt not but thy speech shall be more diffuse to him,
than his French shall be to thee.' " COLLIER.
The full passage in Stow (which is borrowed from Caven-
dish's Life of Wolsey) stands thus : " and [Wolsey] speaking
merilie to one of the gentlemen there, being a Welshman,
said, Rice (quoth he), speake you Welsh to them : I doubt not
but that thy speech shall bee more diffuse to him, than his
French shall be to thee." Annales, p. 533, ed. 1615. When
this passage was cited by Toilet in a note on The Merry Wives
of Windsor, act iv. sc. 4, he was not aware that " diffuse to
him" means, 'difficult for him to understand.' " Dyffuse
harde to be vnderstande, diffuse" Palsgrave's Lesclar. de la
Lang. Fr. 1530, fol. Ixxxvi. (Table of Adiect).
" But oft yet by it [logick] a thing playne, bright and pure,
Is made diffuse, vnknowen, harde and obscure."
Barclay's Ship of Fooles, fol. 53, ed. 1570.
"These poetes of auncyente,
They ar to diffuse for me."
Skelton's Phyllyp Sparowe, — Works, i. 74, ed. Dyce.
The quotation from Stow (or rather Cavendish) is, there-
fore, hardly to the purpose. Kent does not wish to render his
speech difficult to be understood, but merely to disorder it, to
disguise it, as he had disguised his person.
Toilet is not the only one of Shakespeare's commentators
who shews extreme ignorance of the language of an earlier
period. On the passage of Hamlet, act iv. sc. 7,
224? KING LEAR.
" And then this should is like a spendthrift sigh,
That hurts by easing," —
Johnson having remarked,
" It is a notion very prevalent, that sighs impair the strength, and
wear out the animal powers ;"
Steevens added ;
" So, in the Governall of Helthe, &c. printed by Wynkyn de
Worde : ' And for why whan a man casteth out that noble humour
too moche, he is hugely dyscolored, and his body moche febled,
more then he lete four sythes, soo moche blode oute of his body' " ! !
— where "four sythes soo moche blode" really means 'four
times so much blood.'
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 395.
" Corn. You know not why we came to visit you.
Reg. Thus out of season, threading dark-ey'd night.
Occasions, noble Gloster, of some poize,
Wherein we must have use of your advice."
The proper punctuation is ;
" Corn. You know not why we came to visit you, —
Reg. Thus out of season, threading dark-ey'd night :
Occasions, noble Gloster," &c.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 397 ; K. p. 58.
" you come with letters against the king, and take Vanity, the
puppet's, part, against the royalty of her father."
" The allusion is evidently to the character of Vanity, in some of
the early Moralities or Moral-plays. She had also probably been
represented in a puppet-show, and hence Kent calls her ' Vanity,
the puppet/ " COLLIER.
In supposing that Kent alludes to a puppet-show, Mr.
Collier is certainly mistaken. Here, as in many other passages
of early writers, "puppet" is nothing more than a term of con-
tempt for a female. So in Beaumont and Fletcher's Little
French Lawyer ;
KING LEAR.
" For he that makes a goddess of & puppet,
Merits no other recompense." Act i. sc. 1 .
" a lady- traitor !
Perish by a proud puppet /" Act iii. sc. 5.
and in Drayton's Elegie vpon the death of the Lady Penelope
Clifton ;
" A thousand silken Puppets should haue died,
And in their fulsome coffins putrified,
Ere in my lines you of their names should heare,
To tell the world that such there euer were," &c.
Elegies, p. 199, — appended to The Battaile of
Ayincourt, £c. ed. 1627.
" Kent. Strike, you slave : stand, rogue, stand ; you neat slave,
strike. [Beating him.
Osw. Help, ho ! murder ! murder !
Enter CORNWALL, REGAN, GLOSTER, EDMUND, and Servants.
Edm. How now ! What's the matter ? Part.
Kent. With you, goodman boy, if you please : come, I'll flesh
you ; come on, young master."
" ' Part' is wanting in the quartos." COLLIER.
Though adopted from the folio by the other modern
editors, "Part" is undoubtedly a stage-direction. This is
clear from its interfering with the dialogue : Edmund asks
" What's the matter?" and Kent immediately replies, " With
you [i. e. ' the matter is with you, I will deal with you'], good-
man boy" &c.
That such a stage-direction is common in old plays, hardly
perhaps requires to be shewn : one instance, however, may be
given ;
" Rich. Art thou content to breath ? [Fight $ part once or twise."
A Pleasant Commodie, called Looke about you,
1600, sig. i 3.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 398.
" Reg. The messengers from our sister and the king."
" All the old copies have 'messengers,' but Oswald is the only
one upon the stage." COLLIER.
KING LEAR.
What could Mr. Collier be thinking of? Oswald is the
messenger " from our sister," Kent the messenger " from the
king."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 399.
" A plague upon your epileptic visage !
Smile you my speeches, as I were a fool ?"
Here neither Mr. Collier nor Mr. Knight has any note, —
nor perhaps is one necessary. But I may just remark that the
explanation of " epileptic visage" cited from Johnson in the
Variorum Shakespeare (and the only one there), is altogether
wrong, — " the frighted countenance of a man ready to fall in
a fit." The context shews that it means ' visage distorted by
grinning.'
Why has Mr. Collier no note on " turn their halcyon
beaks," which occurs a few lines earlier ? Not one reader out
of two hundred will be able to discover the allusion.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 402 ; K. p. 62.
" Come, my lord, away.
[Exeunt REGAN and CORNWALL."
So too the other modern editors : but what becomes of
Edmund, Oswald, and the Servants ? The proper stage-direc-
tion here is ;
" [Exeunt all except Gloster and Kent."
" Take vantage, heavy eyes, not to behold
This shameful lodging. Fortune, good night ;
Smile once more ; turn thy wheel !"
Arrange, with Mr. Knight and the other modern editors ;
" Take vantage, heavy eyes, not to behold
This shameful lodging.
Fortune, good night; smile once more ; turn thy wheel !"
SCENE 3.— C. p. 404 ; K. p. 64.
" Poor Turlygood! poor Tom !"
KING LEAR. 227
" In all the old copies it is printed Turlygod, but ' Turlygood' is
perhaps a corruption of Thoroughlygood." COLLIER.
As the correct orthography of the name is very doubtful,
Mr. Collier would have done better if he had retained (with
Mr. Knight) the spelling of the old eds., and forborne to offer
a conjecture which no body will approve.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 410 ; K. p. 69.
" Lear. Ask her forgiveness ?
Do you but mark how this becomes the house :
' Dear daughter, I confess that I am old ;
Age is unnecessary : on my knees I beg, [Kneeling.
That you'll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food.' "
Mr. Knight remarks ;
" In the modern editions we have here the stage-direction kneel-
ing. We doubt the propriety of this. Lear is not addressing these
words to Regan, but is repeating what he would say to Goneril if he
should ask her forgiveness."
If this speech were not sufficient (and I think it is) to shew
that Lear does more than " repeat what he would say to
Goneril," — that, wishing to impress Regan with the full
absurdity of his asking forgiveness of her sister, he drops
upon his knees, — the immediately-following speech of Regan
would be decisive on the point ;
" Good sir, no more : these are unsightly tricks."
" Infect her beauty,
You f en- suck' d fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,
To fall and blast her pride.
Reg. 0 the blest gods !
So will you wish on me, when the rash mood is on."
This arrangement (adopted also by the other modern edi-
tors) is wretched. Regan's speech ought to stand thus ;
" Reg. O the blest gods ! so will you wish on me,
When the rash mood is on."
The passages in Shakespeare and our other old dramatists,
22S KING LEAR.
where the metre does not run on regularly from speech to
speech, are innumerable.
The preceding passage is given by Mr. Knight from the
folio, thus ;
" Infect her beauty.
You fen-suck'd fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,
To fall and blister,"—
which is a sheer corruption.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 412.
" Lear. Return to her ? and fifty men dismiss'd ?
No, rather I abjure all roofs, and choose
To wage against the enmity o' the air ;
To be a comrade with the wolf and owl. —
Necessity's sharp pinch f — Return with her?"
I cannot imagine how Mr. Collier understood the words
" Necessity's sharp pinch" when he disconnected them from
what precedes by a full-point. The other modern editors give
what is obviously the right punctuation ;
" To be a comrade with the wolf and owl, —
Necessity's sharp pinch !"
SCENE 4.— C. p. 415.
" Gon. 'Tis his own blame hath put himself from rest,
And must needs taste his folly."
Is, with the above punctuation, nonsense. Point, as the
other modern editors do ;
" Gon. 'Tis his own blame ; hath put himself from rest,
And must needs taste his folly."
" hath," of course, is equivalent to ' he hath.'
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 420 ; K. p. 83.
" Lear. No, I will be the pattern of all patience ; I will say no-
thing."
KING LEAR. 229
So also Mr. Knight. But this speech ought to be (like
all the other speeches of Lear in this scene) verse ;
" Lear. No, I will be the pattern of all patience ;
I will say nothing."
SCENE 6. — C. p. 436.
" Fool. And I'll go bed at noon."
Read, with all the old eds. which contain this speech, and
all the other modern ones ;
" Fool. And I'll go to bed at noon."
SCENE 7.— C. p. 440 ; K. p. 97.
" Reg. To whose hands
Have you sent the lunatic king ? Speak.
Reg. Wherefore
To Dover ? Wast thou not charg'd at peril — "
Of the first of these speeches Messrs. Malone and Knight
give the right arrangement, viz. ;
" Reg. To whose hands have you sent the lunatic king ?
Speak."
Of the second speech Mr. Knight alone gives the right
arrangement, viz. ;
" Reg. Wherefore to Dover ? Wast thou not charg'd at peril — "
that it was intended to stand as a single line, is evident from
the next speech ;
" Corn. Wherefore to Dover ? Let him answer that."
" Glo. Because I would not see thy cruel nails
Pluck out his poor old eyes ; nor thy fierce sister
In his anointed flesh rash boarish fangs."
" So the quartos: the folio poorly reads 'stick boarish fangs,'"
&c. COLLIER.
The other modern editors agree in adopting the reading of
the folio, " stick."
230 KING LEAR.
On the passage, " Sir, I mist my purpose in his arm,
raslbd his doublet-sleeve," &c. Jonson's Every Man out of
his Humour, — Works, ii. 1 53, Gifford remarks ;
" To rash, (a verb which we have improvidently suffered to grow
obsolete,) is to strike obliquely with violence, as a wild boar does
with his tusk. It is observable with what accuracy Shakspeare has
corrected the old quarto of King Lear, which read,
* nor thy fierce sister
In his anointed flesh rash bearish fangs/
for which he has properly given, ' stick boarish fangs/"
SCENE 7.— C. p. 441.
" Corn. If you see, vengeance, — "
There ought to be no point after " see " : Cornwall alludes
to what Gloster has just said ;
" but I shall see
The winged vengeance overtake such children."
ACT IV.
SCENE 6.— C. p. 458.
" If Edgar live, O, bless him ! —
Now, fellow, fare thee well. [He leaps, and falls along.
Edg. Gone, sir: farewell. —
And yet I know not how conceit may rob," &c.
The stage-direction is wrongly placed: Gloster certainly
does not " leap," till after Edgar has said " Gone, sir : fare-
well."
Mr. Knight rightly explains " Gone, sir ;"
" Gloster has previously told Edgar, ' go thou further off ; ' and
when Gloster again speaks to him, he says, ' Gone, sir.' "
" Look up a height."
Read,
" Look up a- height."
KING LEAR.
SCENE 7.— C. p. 469.
"Lear. You are a spirit, I know. Where did you die ?"
" So the folio, and two of the quartos : the other quarto, ' When
did you die ?' The difference is not material, but modern editors,
who profess most to follow the folio, have here, as in many other
instances, deserted it without notice." COLLIER.
No wonder that the other modern editors deserted the
folio here ; for the reading " Where" is all but nonsense.
ACT v.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 472 ; K. p. 134.
" Edm. Fear me not. —
She, and the duke her husband, —
Enter ALBANY, GONEBIL, and Soldiers."
So, too, Messrs. Malone and Knight very improperly put
a comma and break at the end of Edmund's speech, as if it
were imperfect. On the contrary, it is complete :
" She, and the duke her husband."
i. e. f Here she comes, and the duke her husband.'
SCENE 3. — C. p. 484.
" Whilst I was big in clamour, came there a man,
Who, having seen me in my worst estate,
Shunn'd my abhorr'd society ; but then, finding
Who 't was that so endur'd, with his strong arms
He fasten'd on my neck, and bellow'd out
As he'd burst heaven ; threw me on my father ;
Told the most piteous tale of Lear and him," &c.
" So every quarto ; but some modern editors read ' threw Mm on
my father,' without assigning any reason for the unauthorised change.
We adhere to the old text, admitting, however, that it is more likely
that Kent, in grief, should have thrown himself upon Gloster, than
that, in his awkward violence, he should have thrown Edgar upon his
father's body." COLLIER.
Malone, like Mr. Collier, retains the old reading; " the
text," he says, "being intelligible, and it being very impro-
KING LEAR.
bable that the word me should have been printed instead of
him."
The reading "me" is doubtless "intelligible" enough;
but Kent's tumbling down Edgar on the dead body of his
father is an incident more suited to a comic pantomime than
to a serious narrative in a tragedy. The progress of the error
here is plain; — "him" — "'em" (how often these two words
are confounded, has been already shewn, p. 64) — " me." Other
corruptions may be traced in the same way : for instance,
we sometimes find " thou," where the sense positively requires
" yon," — the progress of that error having been — " yon"—
"you"— "thou."
SCENE 3.— C. p. 490 ; K. p. 149.
" he hates him,
That would upon the rack of this tough world
Stretch him out longer."
So too Messrs. Malone and Knight. — Read, by all means,
as Pope did, " rough."
233
OTHELLO.
[Vol. vii. COLLIER ; vol. viii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 498.
" One Michael Cassio, a Florentine,
A fellow almost damn'd in a fair wife."
" This line has occasioned a good deal of controversy, and various
conjectures have been hazarded. Tyrwhitt would read life for ' wife ;'
and Mr. Petrie of Edinburgh suggests to me, that 'wife' may have
been misprinted for guise, which, I must own, is not a very probable
conjecture. The text is most likely right." COLLIER.
The text may be right, though I doubt it : but I cannot
help wondering greatly that Mr. Petrie, when he conjectured
"guise," should not have stumbled upon " wise" (way).
SCENE 2.— C. p. 508 ; K. p. 363.
" The wealthy curled darlings of our nation."
Mr. Knight gives, with the folio, " dearling," which he
says is " the old Saxon word dearling in a plural sense." The
fact is, the s has been omitted Irf £Jie folio by a mistake of the
compositor. In Shakespeare's time dearling could never have
been used as a plural. That even Spenser (who antiquated his
language much more than any of his contemporaries) did not
venture to employ such an archaism, is proved by the follow-
ing passage of his Hymne in honour of Love;
" There thou them placest in a paradize
Of all delight and ioyous happie rest,
Where they doe feede on nectar heauenly-wize,
With Hercules and Hebe, and the rest
Of Venus dearlinys, through her bountie blest ;
And lie like 'gods in yuorie beds arayd,
With rose and lillies ouer them displayd."
234? OTHELLO.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 512.
" Whoe'er he be that, in this foul proceeding,
Hath thus beguil'd your daughter of herself,
And you of her, the bloody book of law
You shall yourself read in the bitter letter,
After its own sense ; yea, though our proper son
Stood in your action."
" ' After its own sense,' is after the very sense of the ' bitter
letter' of ' the book of law/ The folio has ' After your own sense.' "
COLLIER.
The reading of the folio (adopted by the other modern
editors) is manifestly the true one : " After your own sense,"
i. e. ' According to your own interpretation.'
SCENE 3. — C. p. 515.
" Whereof by parcels she had something heard,
But not intentively."
" f. e. coherently, or, more strictly, attentively." COLLIER.
How could the word embrace two such different signifi-
cations as coherently and attentively ? The truth is, intentively
never meant coherently : it was always used as equivalent to
attentively, not only by the writers of Shakespeare's time, but
by those of a much earlier date. Palsgrave has " Intentyfe
hedefull." — " Ententyfe, busy to do a thynge or to take hede
to a thyng." Lesclar. de la Lang. Fr.9 1530, fols. Ixxxx.
Ixxxvii. (where he renders both by the Fr. ententif.)
SCENE 3.— C. p. 520 ; K. p. 374.
" That I did love the Moor to live with him,
My downright violence and storm of fortunes
May trumpet to the world."
" The quarto, 1622, alone reads 'scorn of fortunes,' which may
be preferable." COLLIER.
So also Messrs. Malone and Knight.
The quarto 1622 is, no doubt, right. Those editors who
defend "storm," quote (as usual) passages which they call
OTHELLO. 235
parallel, but which in fact are nothing to the purpose. In
Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest Mans Fortune) act iv. sc. 1,
we find, according to the old eds.,
"But Time and Fortune, run your courses with him,
He'll laugh and storm you when you shew most hate ;"
while the excellent MS. of that play in my possession affords
the true reading ;
" He'll laugh and scorn you," &c.
" Vouch with me, heaven, I therefore beg it not,
To please the palate of my appetite ;
Nor to comply with heat, the young affects,
In my defunct and proper satisfaction;
But to be free and bounteous to her mind."
"This passage (so printed in every old copy) has occasioned
much dispute and long notes : it seems to us that nothing can be
clearer, allowing only a little latitude of expression. Othello refers
to his age, elsewhere several times alluded to, and ' in my defunct
and proper satisfaction,' is merely, ' in my own dead satisfaction,' or
gratification, the youthful passions, or ' young affects,' being com-
paratively ' defunct' in him. For the sense, though not for the har-
mony of the verse, it ought to have run, ' for my proper and defunct
satisfaction/ and had it so run, we doubt if so much ink would have
been spilt and wasted upon it. It requires no proof that ' proper'
was often used for own: in this very scene (p. 512) the Duke says,
' yea, though our proper son/ &c. Mr. Amyot fully concurs with
me." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight, who also follows the old copies, remarks ;
" We would only observe, that comply may be used in the sense
of supply, that affects are affections, and that defunct does not neces-
sarily mean dead. Tyrwhitt considers that defunct may be used in
the Latin sense si performed. As function has the same Latin root,
we would suggest that Shakspere used defunct for functional, and
then the meaning is clear; nor to gratify the young affections, in
my official and individual satisfaction."
Few persons, I apprehend, will be satisfied with Mr.
Collier's explanation ; nobody, assuredly, with Mr. Knight's.
Neither of them seems to have been aware that there is a
OTHELLO.
passage in Massinger's Bondman, act i. sc. 3, which was un-
doubtedly copied from the present one, viz.
" Let me wear
Your colours, lady ; and though youthful heats,
That look no further than your outward form,
Are long since buried in me, while I live,
I am," &c.
and another (also imitated from the same source) in Fletcher's
Fair Maid of the Inn, act i. sc. 1,
" Shall we take our fortune ? and, while our cold fathers
(In whom long since their youthful heats were dead)
Talk much of Mars, serve under Venus' ensigns,
And seek a mistress ?"
These passages (as Giffbrd has already observed) shew how
the lines of Shakespeare were understood by his contempo-
raries. They also shew that the alteration of a single letter,
the change of "my" to "me" (which was first made by
Upton), is absolutely necessary;
" I therefore beg it not,
To please the palate of my appetite,
Nor to comply with heat (the young affects
In me defunct) and proper satisfaction ;
But to be free and bounteous to her mind."
i. e. (as Johnson well explains it) ;
"I ask it not, to please appetite, or satisfy loose desires (the
passions of youth which I have now outlived), or for any particular
gratification of myself, but merely that I may indulge the wishes of
my wife."
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 531.
" lago. Sir, would she give you so much of her lips,
As of her tongue she oft bestows on me,
You'd have enough.
Des. Alas ! she has no speech.
lago. In faith, too much ;
I find it still, when I have leave to sleep,"
OTHELLO. 237
When Mr. Collier adopted the reading of the folio, " leave,"
what meaning did he attach to it ? did he suppose it to be only
another form of " leve" " leef," or " lief," (a word which, I
apprehend, was never used as a substantive) ? The reading of
the quarto, 1622, " list" (adopted by the other modern editors)
is clearly the true one.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 538 ; K. p. 394.
" If this poor trash of Venice, whom I trace
For his quick hunting, stand the putting on," &c.
" That this reading of the folio is right we have the evidence of
the quarto, 1630 : the quarto, 1622, has crush for ' trace.' Warburton,
with some plausibility, would alter ' trash' to brack, which means
(see Vol. iii. p. 108 ; Vol. iv. p. 288 ; Vol. vi. p. 44) a dog, but as we
find ' trash' in two of the old copies (not printed from each other) we
may presume that it is to be taken to refer to the worthlessness of
Roderigo. ' Trace' seems used to indicate some species of confine-
ment (like a trace applied to horses) in order to keep back a dog
which was too quick in hunting. Malone substituted trash for ' trace'
without any authority," &c. COLLIER.
" The reading of the quarto is, —
' If this poor trash of Venice, whom I crush
For his quick hunting.'
Crush is evidently a corruption, and is properly rejected. But why
do the commentators reject the trace of the folio, substituting trash ?
because they say trace is a corruption of trash. Now, on the con-
trary, the noun trash, and the verb trace, are used with perfect pro-
priety. The trash is the thing traced, put in traces — confined — as
an untrained worthless dog is held, and hence the present meaning
of trash. There is a letter on this subject in ' The Gentleman's
Magazine' for 1763, which satisfactorily establishes the propriety of
the word trace." KNIGHT.
" If this poor trash of Venice" is doubtless the right
reading — trash meaning 'worthless, contemptible person :' so
afterwards the same speaker (lago) says (act v. sc. 1) ;
" Gentlemen all, I do suspect this trash [Bianca]
To be a party in this injury."
238 OTHELLO.
Mr. Knight's explanation of trash, " the thing traced, put
in traces — confined — as an untrained worthless dog is held,"
is borrowed from Richardson's Diet., where we find ; " A trash
— any thing (man, dog) trashed or traced or confined in traces,
that it may not, because it would, run or pursue too fast,
rashly ; like an untrained dog ; a worthless hound : hence it
is — any thing worthless," &c. But in the above explanation
Richardson is undoubtedly mistaken : he gives to trash a
meaning which it never did and never could bear. When used
as a huntsman or dog-trainer's term, or metaphorically with
an allusion to their practices, it invariably signifies the thing
WHICH RESTRAINS : " Above this lower roome shall be your
huntsmans lodging, wherin hee shall also keep his cooples,
liams, collars, trashes, boxes," &c. Markham's Countrey Con-
tentments, b. i. c. i. p. 15, ed. 1615. The trash — whether a
strap, a rope dragging loose on the ground, or a weight — was
fastened round the neck of a too forward dog, to check his
movements.
SCENE 3.—C. p. 545 ; K. p. 400.
" Mon. 'Zounds ! I bleed still : I am hurt to the death. [He faints."
Mr. Knight prints, with the folio ;
" Mon. I bleed still; I am hurt to the death. — He dies — "
and remarks ;
" Because these words [' He dies'] are not found in the quarto,
the line there being eked out with zounds ! Malone supposes that
they were absurdly inserted as a stage-direction. It is evident that,
although Montano fancies himself hurt to the death, he is still ready
to attack Cassio, as his words express, he dies !"
This is one of the notes in which Mr. Knight shews with
what ingenuity he can defend even the grossest blunders of the
old editions. Mr. Collier has well observed ;
" The true stage-direction, for which ' He dies' was, no doubt,
intended, is found in the quarto, 1630, ' He faints.' "
OTHELLO. 239
SCENE 3. — C. p. 551 ; K. p. 404.
" I may say so in this respect, for that he hath devoted and given
up himself to the contemplation, mark, and devotement of her parts
and graces."
The manifest misprint " devotement" was first corrected to
" denotement" by Theobald, who observed, " I cannot per-
suade myself that our poet would ever have said, any one
devoted himself to the devotement of any thing." Mr. Knight,
however, as well as Mr. Collier, has so " persuaded himself."
On the line of the Merry Wives of Windsor) act iv. sc. 6,
(vol. i. 262);
" The better to denote her to the doctor,"
Mr. Collier remarks ;
" The folio, 1623, reads * deuote her,' and in the other folios the
u is changed into v. There can be no doubt that the n was accident-
ally turned, and that the true word is ' denote.'"
To make the matter still more ridiculous, Mr. Knight prints,
"to the contemplation — mark! — and devotement," &c. :
" mark !" he says, " is here used as an interjection."
ACT III.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 569.
" Oth. Your napkin is too little ;
[Lets fall her Napkin.
Let it alone. Come, I'll go in with you."
" We take this necessary stage-direction [' Lets fall her Napkin]
from a manuscript note in a hand- writing of the time, in the Duke of
Devonshire's copy of the quarto, 1622. It is wanting in all the old
editions." COLLIER.
The stage-direction inserted by the other modern editors
is far better, viz. " [He puts the handkerchief from him, and
it drops." Indeed, that given by Mr. Collier, when placed
opposite to Othello's speech, is positively wrong, because it
makes him drop the handkerchief. There can be no doubt
that, while Othello pushes away the handkerchief, Desdemona
lets it fall : Emilia (who is now on the stage) says presently,
240 OTHELLO.
" she let it drop by negligence ;
And, to th' advantage, I, being here, took't up."
SCENE 3.-— C. p. 573 ; K. p. 426.
" her name, that was as fresh
As Dian's visage, is now begrim'd and black
As mine own face."
" Our text is that of the quarto, 1630, which agrees with the
folio, excepting that the former corrects an error of the latter by
reading ' her name' for ' my name.' " COLLIER.
Mr. Knight prints ;
" My name, that was as fresh," &c.
with the following note ;
" In all modern editions, except Rowe's, this has been changed
to ' her name.' There is probably not a more fatal corruption of the
meaning of the poet amongst the thousand corruptions for which his
editors are answerable. It destroys the master-key to Othello's cha-
racter, It is his intense feeling of honour that makes his wife's sup-
posed fault so terrific to him. It is not that Desdemona's name
is begrimed and black, but that his own name is degraded. This one
thought, here for the first time exhibited, pervades all the rest of
the play ; and when we understand how the poison operates upon
Othello's mind, we are quite prepared fully to believe him when he
says, in conclusion, —
' For nought I did in hate, but all in honour.'
The thought that his own name is now tarnished drives him at once
into a phrenzy. He has said, ' /'// have some proof ;' but the moment
that the idea of dishonour comes across his sensitive nature, he bursts
into uncontrolled fury : —
' If there be cords, or knives,
Poison, or fire, or suffocating streams,
/'// not endure it.' "
The word " own " in the last line of the passage is alone
sufficient to refute Mr. Knight's long and laborious defence of
" My." Othello would not have said " MY name is now as
black as mine OWN face."
Mr. Knight's text of the present tragedy is, on the whole,
OTHELLO. 241
as bad as his text of Hamlet ; and a worse text of either play
could hardly be produced.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 575.
" Now do I see 'tis true. — Look here, lago ;
All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven : 'tis gone. —
Arise, black vengeance," &c.
Arrange, with the other modern editors ;
" Now do I see 'tis true. — Look here, lago ;
All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven :
'Tis gone.—
Arise, black vengeance," &c.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 579.
" the hearts of old gave hands,
But our new heraldry is — hands, not hearts."
The reader probably will recollect with dismay the immense
mass of annotation which this passage has called forth in con-
sequence of Warburton's ridiculous idea that the poet alluded
here to the new order of baronets created by King James. I
have only to observe; first, — that the word "heraldry" (which
the commentators are surprised at finding here) was evidently
suggested to Shakespeare by the words in the preceding line,
"gave hands" (to "give arms" being an heraldic term) ; secondly,
that Warner, in his Albions England, has,
" My hand shall neuer giue my heart, my heart shall giue my hand."
p. 282, ed. 1596.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 592.
" lago. Do it not with poison, strangle her in her bed, even the
bed she hath contaminated."
This speech (printed by all the modern editors as prose) is,
I suspect, two lines of blank verse.
242 OTHELLO.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 595.
" Lod. Is this the noble Moor whom our full senate
Call all-in-all sufficient ? — This the noble nature
Whom passion could not shake ? whose solid virtue," &c.
" Thus [' This the noble nature'] both the quartos : the folio,
' Is this the nature.' As far as a ten-syllable verse is concerned,
' noble' is certainly too much ; but instances of lines of twelve sylla-
bles have been numerous, and the epithet is an important addition to
the sense." COLLIER.
The word "noble" in the second line (retained also by
Malone) was undoubtedly inserted by a mistake of the com-
positor of the first quarto, his eye having caught it from the
preceding line.
ACT v.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 618.
" Qth. Being done,
There is no pause.
Des. But while I say one prayer.
Oth. It is too late. [He smothers her.
Des. 0 Lord, Lord, Lord !
Emil. \Within.~] My lord, my lord ! what ho ! my lord,
my lord /"
"These exclamations [' O Lord, Lord, Lord!'] are only in the
quarto, 1622." COLLIER.
And there Mr. Collier ought (with the other modern edi-
tors) to have left them ; for they were most probably foisted
into the text by the players. So far is " O Lord, Lord,
Lord /" from adding to the terror or pathos of the scene,
that it is disgustingly vulgar ; and being immediately followed
by Emilia's
*' My lord, my lord ! what ho ! my lord, my lord .'"
the effect of the whole is not a little comic.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 624.
O murderous coxcomb ! what should such a fool
Do with so good a woman ?"
OTHELLO. 243
" ' Do with so good a wife,' only in the folio." COLLIER.
It is absolutely necessary to adopt here (as the other mo-
dern editors do) the reading of the folio.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 629.
" of one, whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away,
Richer than all his tribe."
" The meaning is very clear, the allusion obscure ; and the pro-
bability is that Shakespeare referred to some known fable of the
time, now lost." COLLIER.
" The word tribe" observes Boswell, " is not, as Mr. Malone
[who here printed "Judean"] seemed to suppose, peculiarly appli-
cable to the Jews. It meant in Shakspeare's time, as we learn from
Cokeram, a kindred, and it is constantly used at this day in speaking
of the Indians."
It was rather unnecessary to refer to Cokeram, since, in
the present play, lago says,
" Good heaven, the souls of all my tribe defend
From jealousy !" Act iii. sc. 3.
Boswell proceeds ;
" The Jews are not in general described as willing to throw away
what is valuable ; and it is not likely that Shakspeare would allude
to an anecdote of a single individual, of which perhaps none of his
auditors had ever heard ; but in our author's time, when voyages of
discovery to America were common, each putter out of five for one
was probably stimulated by a description of the riches he might find
there, and of the facility with which the Indians base, on account of
their ignorance, would part with them. I will only add, that two
succeeding poets have given the Indians the same character :
' So the unskilfull Indian those bright gems
Which might adde majestic to diadems
'Mong the waves scatters. '
Habington's Castara — To Castara weeping.
So, also, in The Woman's Conquest by Sir Edward Howard :
' Behold my queen —
Who with no more concern He cast away
244 OTHELLO.
Then Indians do a pearl that ne're did know
Its value.' "
The latter part of the above note (the most valuable of
Boswell's contributions to the illustration of Shakespeare)
proves, I think, decidedly, that Othello alludes to no particu-
lar story, but to "the Indian" as generally described: and to
the passages just cited, the following may be added ;
"The wretched Indian spumes the golden Ore."
Drayton's Legend of Matilda, sig. F f 7, —
Poems, 8vo, n. d.
245
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.
[Vol. viii. COLLIER; vol. ii. Tragedies, Pict. ed. KNIGHT.*]
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 26 ; K. p. 289.
" But all the charms of love,
Salt Cleopatra, soften thy wand lip !
Let witchcraft join with beauty, lust with both :" &c.
" It may be doubted whether ' wand' and ' lip' ought not to be
united by a hyphen : ' wand ' probably has reference to Cleopatra's
power of enchantment — that her lip is as potent as a magician's wand ;
and this construction seems warranted by what immediately follows,
' Let witchcraft join with beauty.' ' Wand' is the ' witchcraft,' and
'lip' the 'beauty.' The conjectures that 'wand' is misprinted for
fond, or warm, seem little better than idle ; although, as Mr. B. Field
suggests, waned or wand might, possibly, be the true reading."
COLLIER.
What Mr. Collier says here about Cleopatra's " wand-lip"
i. e. lip as potent as a magician's wand, cannot be allowed the
merit of originality ; at least, it. had been previously said in
that mass of folly, ignorance, and conceit, Jackson's Shake-
speare's Genius Justified; and one can hardly suppose that
such a wild fancy would spring up spontaneously in the brains
of two commentators. Not even in Lycophron, the most
enigmatical of poets, is there any expression half so far-fetched
or so strangely-compounded as " wand-lip" ! When Mr. Col-
lier mentioned, as something new, Mr. B. Field's suggestion
that " waned or wan'd might, possibly, be the true reading,"
was he ignorant that both Malone and Mr. Knight had printed
"wan'd"?
Whether the word be written wand or wan'd, it is evi-
dently the past participle of the verb wane : Cleopatra herself
has previously touched on the decrease of her beauty ;
* See note, p. 158.
246 ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.
" think on me,
That am with Phoebus' amorous pinches black,
And wrinkled deep in time."
Act i. sc. 5.
A passage (though a comic one) of Fletcher's Queen of
Corinth may be cited here ;
"oh, ruby lips,
Love hath to you been like wine-vinegar,
Now you look wan and pale, lips' ghosts ye are !"
Act iv. sc. 1.
SCENE 2. — C. p. 32.
" Ant. You wrong this presence ; therefore, speak no more.
Eno. Go to then ; your considerate stone."
" It may be a question, whether Enobarbus means to call Antony
' a considerate stone,' or to say merely that he will be silent as a
stone. If the former, we must, with Johnson, change ' your' of the
folios to you; but the latter affords a clear meaning without any
alteration of the ancient text." COLLIER.
Enobarbus call Antony a stone ! he would as soon have
ventured to throw one at him. Johnson's proposed alteration,
of which Mr. Collier cites only a part, bad as it certainly was,
did not involve such an absurdity.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 41 ; K. p. 294.
" a hand, that kings
Have lipp'd, and trembled kissing.
Mess. First, madam, he is well.
Cleo. Why, there's more gold.
But, sirrah, mark, we use
To say, the dead are well : bring it to that," &c.
Arrange, with Mr. Knight ;
" Cleo. Why, there's more gold. But, sirrah, mark ; we use
To say the dead are well : bring it to that," &c.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 44.
" Cleo. O ! that his fault should make a knave of thee,
That art not! What! thou'rt sure of? — Get thee hence :" &c.
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 247
" Our punctuation of this disputed passage is that of Monck
Mason; but he wished also to read, 'What! thou'rt sure oft?" —
a slight change, indeed, but as it is not absolutely necessary, we do
not carry our variation from the old copies farther than changing the
pointing: in the folio, 1623, it stands,
' O that his fault should make a knave of thee,
That art not what thou'rt sure of.'
This, it must be admitted, is far from intelligible. By the words,
' What! thou'rt sure of?' Cleopatra intends to inquire of the messen-
ger once more, whether he is certain of the tidings he has brought.
The meaning of the first part of the passage, as we have given it, is
very evident." COLLIER.
Monck Mason's punctuation, with the change of " of" to
" oft," afforded at least a sense : but Mr. Collier, by adopting
that punctuation without changing " of" to " oft," has made
the passage mere nonsense.
I should strongly protest against any deviation from the
old eds. here. " That art not what thou'rt sure of" may
mean, ' That art not the evil tidings of which thou givest me
such assurance.'
ACT III.
SCENE 9.— C. p. 77.
" Ant. Egypt, thou knew'st too well,
My heart was to thy rudder tied by the strings,
And thou should' st tow me after : o'er my spirit
The full supremacy thou knew'st, and that
Thy beck might from the bidding of the gods
Command me."
Read, with the other modern editors, " Thy." In such a
case as this the authority of the old eds. is nothing.
SCENE 11.— C. p. 82 ; K. p. 311.
" Thyr. So.—
Thus then, thou most renown'd : Caesar entreats,
Not to consider in what case thou stand'st,
Farther than he is Ccesar's."
248 ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.
So, indeed, the first folio ; but it is evidently a misprint,
though defended by Malone. The second folio gives the true
reading, " Farther than he is Casar ,•" and so Mr. Knight.
The folios have the very same misprint in act iv. sc. 12,
where (p. 1 06) Mr. Collier, alone of the modern editors, care-
fully retains it ;
" she, Eros, has
Pack'd cards with Cesar's," &c.
ACT IV.
SCENE 6.— C. p. 96.
" Alexas did revolt, and went to Jewry on
Affairs of Antony ; there did dissuade
Great Herod to incline himself to Caesar,
And leave his master Antony : for this pains,
Csesar hath hang'd him."
" So all the folios, and, as Johnson says, perhaps rightly."
COLLIER.
If the folios were forty instead of four, such a reading
could not be right : but (as Malone observes) the question is
at once settled by the old translation of Plutarch which Shake-
speare used for this tragedy, where we find, "he persuaded
him to turne to Caesar."
SCENE 10.— C. p. 102.
" Swallows have built
In Cleopatra's sails their nests : the auguries
Say, they know not, — they cannot tell ; — look grimly,
And dare not speak their knowledge."
" i. e. the declarations of the augurs : it is unnecessary, with all
modern editors, to change the word, found in all the old copies, to
augurers" COLLIER.
This is a degree beyond the ridiculous. What ! the au-
gurnzs look grimly, and dare not speak their knowledge !
SCENE 12. — C. p. 109.
" The guard !— how 9— O, despatch me !"
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 249
" Modern editors have usually printed ho ! for ' how ?' of the
folios. The Rev. Mr. Barry proposes the substitution of now ; but it
seems to us that the text hardly requires alteration." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight also retains " how ?" but it was doubtless in-
tended for " ho !" both by the author and the printer. That
" how" was frequently put for ho in Shakespeare's time, Ma-
lone has shewn by the following citations from the Hamlet of
1604;
" Queen. Help, how !
Pol. What how, help."
" O villainy ! how, let the door be lock'd."
I may add, that in earlier writers that mode of spelling ho was
still more frequent ; see, for instance, Skel ton's Works, i. 104,
267 ; ii. 6, 8, ed. Dyce.
SCENE 13.— C. p. Ill ; K. p. 326.
" The varying shore o' th' world. O Antony, Antony, Antony !
Help, Charmian, help, Iras, help : help, friends
Below ; let's draw him hither.
Ant. Peace !"
The above arrangement, than which none could be worse,
is given also by Malone. That adopted by Mr. Knight seems
to be the best of which the passage will admit ; —
" The varying shore o' the world. — O Antony I
Antony, Antony ! — Help, Charmian ; help, Iras, help ;
Help, friends below ; let's draw him hither.
Ant. Peace ;"
ACT v.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 130 ; K. p. 335.
" Cleo. As sweet as balm, as soft as air, as gentle. —
O Antony! — Nay, I will take thee too. —
[Applying another Asp to her Arm.
What should I stay — [Falls on a Bed, and dies.
Char. In this wild world ? — So, fare thee well," &c.
Here Mr. Collier has no note. Mr. Knight observes that
some of the modern editions have turned wild into wide."
250 ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.
Steevens conjectured that Shakespeare " might have writ-
ten mid (i. e. vile, according to ancient spelling) for worth-
• less ;" and here Steevens was doubtless right. The misprint
of wild for vild is one of the commonest in early books : the
plays of Beaumont and Fletcher furnish the following exam-
\ples;
" I will not lose a word
To this wild [read vild] woman," &c.
The Maid's Tragedy, act iii. sc. 1.
" and gave away
My soul to this young man, that now dares say
I am a stranger, not the same, more wild [read vild]/' &c.
The Faithful Shepherdess, act iv. sc. 4.
" and from yourself
Have borrow'd power I never gave you here,
To do these wild [so the first 4to, the later 4tos vild,
fol. 1679 vile] unmanly things."
The Scornful Lady, act iii. sc. 1 .
" Or am I of so wild [read vild] and low a blood,
So nurs'd in infamies — "
The Little French Lawyer, act iii. sc. 5.
251
CYMBELINE.
[Vol. viii. COLLIER ; vol. viii. KNIGHT.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 141 ; K. p. 204.
" I Gent. We must forbear. Here comes the gentle-
man, the queen, and princess."
Arrange, with Mr. Knight;
" We must forbear. Here comes the gentleman,
The queen and princess."
SCENE 2.— C. p. 142 ; K. p. 204.
" though the king
Hath charg'd you should not speak together. [Exit Queen.
Imo. 0 dissembling courtesy ! How fine this tyrant
Can tickle," &c.
So too Mr. Knight. A little after, in this scene, both he
and Mr. Collier give ;
" A lustre to it.
Cym. O thou vile one !
Imo. Sir,
It is your fault that I have lov'd Posthumus."
Now, it is just as necessary, for the sake of the verse, that
" O " in the former passage should stand by itself,
(" Imo. O
Dissembling courtesy," &c.)
as that " Sir" in the latter passage should be so placed. But
Mr. Collier and Mr. Knight, when they reject here and in
several other places the arrangement of the modern editors,
fancy that they are restoring the metre of Shakespeare — by
following the old copies.
252 CYMBEL1NE.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 154; K. p. 214.
" lack. You are a friend, and therein the wiser. If you buy
ladies' flesh at a million a dram, you cannot preserve it from tainting.
But I see, you have some religion in you, that you fear."
Both Mr. Collier and Mr. Knight pass by this speech
without any remark. After carefully comparing it with the
context, I feel perfectly satisfied that Warburton's correction,
" You are afraid, and therein the wiser," is the genuine read-
ing. In the attempts of the commentators to explain, " You
are a friend, and therein the wiser," there is nothing but
weakness.
SCENE 6.— C. p. 158 ; K. p. 218.
" the agent for his master,
And the remembrancer of her, to hold
The hand fast to her lord."
So too Mr. Knight ; and most erroneously. — Read
" The handfast to her lord,"
i. e. The contract. — Compare Beaumont and Fletcher ;
" Should leave the handfast that he had of grace."
The Woman-Hater, act iii. sc. 1.
" I knit this holy handfast"
Wit at Several Weapons, act v. sc. 1.
(where the modern editors give wrongly, with the old eds.,
" hand fast.")
" I have given him that,
Wljich, if he take, shall quite unpeople her
Of leigers for her sweet."
" Possibly ' sweet,' as the Rev. Mr. Barry proposes, ought to be
suite." COLLIER.
Surely, though such a villanous conjecture as this might i
be sent to Mr. Collier, he was not bound to record it.
SCENE 7.— C. p. 161.
" ' What woman is, yea, what she cannot choose
But must be, — will his free hours languish
For assur'd bondage ?'
CYMBELINE. 253
Imo. Will my lord say so ?"
Arrange, with all the other modern editors ;
" But must be, — will his free hours languish for
Assured bondage."
Had Mr. Collier any particular objection here to "for" at
the end of the line ? We have afterwards in this play (act ii.
sc. 3) ;
" I will make
One of her women lawyer to me ; for
I yet not understand the case myself." p. 173.
"For
The contract you pretend with that base wretch," &c.
p. 174.
SCENE 7.— C. p. 165.
" 'tis plate of rare device, and jewels
Of rich and exquisite form. Their values great,
And I am something curious, being strange,
To have them in safe stowage."
The other modern editors point ;
" 'tis plate, of rare device, and jewels,
Of rich and exquisite form ; their values great ;
And I am something curious," &c., —
with which punctuation " values" is right enough. But when
Mr. Collier (in opposition to all the old copies) made " Their"
the commencement of a new sentence, it became absolutely
necessary to read ( value *s."
ACT II.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 170.
" Swift, swift, you dragons of the night, that dawning
May bare the raven's eye."
" Mr. Barron Field thinks that this expression has been hitherto
understood too literally, as meaning that the ' raven's eye' is ' bared,'
or opened, by the ' dawning' : he apprehends that night is here poe-
tically described as ' the raven.' This may certainly be so, and the
suggestion deserves attention, though we are not acquainted with any
254 CYMBELINE.
other instance where night is so personified, admitting that the ' ra-
ven' and its plumage are often mentioned as accompaniments of, or
similes for night ; as in the well-known words of Milton : —
' smoothing the raven down
Of darkness till it smiled.' " COLLIER.
That " you dragons of the night" mean ' you dragons that
draw the chariot of the Night,' neither Mr. Field nor Mr. Col-
lier will, I presume, dispute : here, therefore, Night is spoken
of as A GODDESS ; and is it to be supposed for a moment
that in the very next line Shakespeare would turn her into
A RAVEN ? Besides, how could the " dawning" be said to open
the eye of Night ? do not poets invariably describe Night as
betaking herself to repose at the dawn of Day ?
" Darknesse is fled : looke, infant Morn hath drawne
Bright siluer curtains 'bout the couch of Night."
Marston's Antonios Reuenge, 1602, sig. B 2.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 171 ; K. p. 233.
" If this penetrate, I will consider your music the better : if it do
not, it is a vice in her ears, which horse-hairs, and calves' -guts, nor
the voice of unpaved eunuch to boot, can never amend."
" 'Vice' is misprinted voice in all the old folios." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight retains " voice in her ears," observing, " It has
been changed to vice. But why ?" The answer is, because
common sense shews the absolute necessity of the change.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 179 ; K. p. 242.
" lack. Then, if you can,
Be pale : I beg but leave to air this jewel ; see !—
{Producing the Bracelet.''
Here Mr. Collier has no note. Mr. Knight points ;
" lack. Then, if you can
[Pulling out the bracelet.
Be pale, I beg but leave to air this jewel : see !" —
with the following note ;
" The passage is usually pointed thus —
CYMBELINE. 255
' Then, if you can
Be pale : I beg but leave to air this jewel.'
Johnson interprets this reading, ' if you can forbear to flush your
cheek with rage.' Boswell says, ' if you can restrain yourself within
bounds. To pale is commonly used to confine or surround/ We
follow the punctuation of the original, which gives a clear meaning —
' Then, if you can
Be pale, I beg but leave to air this jewel.'
lachimo has produced no effect upon Posthumus up to this moment ;
but he now says, if you can be pale, I will see what this jewel will
do to make you change countenance."
I have no doubt that the punctuation given by Mr. Col-
lier is right ; and that the passage means, ' Then, if you can
(i. e. if any thing has power to make you change colour), be
pale (become pale at the sight of this) : I beg,' &c.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 180.
" It may be probable she lost it ; or,
Who knows, if one, her women, being corrupted,
Hath stolen it from her ?"
"The Editor of the folio, 1632, inserted of before 'her women,'
but unnecessarily, the expression being elliptical — ' if one, her women,'
is the same as ' if one q/"her women.' " COLLIER.
Mr. Collier here adopts from the first folio an error, in
defence of which no body ever dreamed of saying a word.
Such an ellipsis is impossible. We have had before in the
present play ;
" I will make
One of her women lawyer to me."
Act ii. sc. 3, p. 173.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.-C. p. 186.
" Pis. How ! of adultery ? Wherefore write you not
What monsters her accuse ? — Leonatus !
O, master ! what a strange infection
Is fallen into thy ear ! What false Italian
256 CYMBELINE.
(As poisonous tongued, as handed) hath prevail'd
On thy too ready hearing ?"
" So every old copy : every modern edition, ' What monster's her
accuser ?' Surely no variation from the ancient text is required."
COLLIER.
The last letter of " accuser" had evidently been omitted in
the first folio by mistake. The reading
" What monsters her accuse ?"
must be wrong ; because, in the first place, we cannot sup-
pose that Shakspeare would have employed here such an
awkward inversion as " her accuse ;" secondly, because we
have in the next line but one, " What false Italian," &c. ;
and, thirdly, because it leaves the metre imperfect.
SCENE 5. — C. p. 202.
" Please you, sir,
Her chambers are all lock'd ; and there's no answer
That will be given to the loud noise we make."
" The preposition of is mistakingly inserted after ' loud' in the
folio, 1623 : it is clearly needless to the sense, and injurious to the
metre ; but modern editors have usually printed the passage (without
notice), ' to the loud'st of noise we make/ in order to preserve what
in fact ought on all accounts to be removed." COLLIER.
The passage, when thus mutilated by Mr. Collier, does
not afford the meaning which the poet certainly intended, viz.
that the very loudest noise which they could make drew forth
no answer. The text of the folio, " the loud of noise" is ma-
nifestly a misprint for " the loud'st of noise."
" Queen. Go, look after.—
[Exit CLOTEN.
Pisanio, thou that stand'st so for Posthumus,
He hath a drug of mine : I pray, his absence
Proceed by swallowing that, for he believes
It is a thing most precious."
Could Mr. Collier possibly suppose that
" Pisanio, thou that stand'st so for Posthumus,
He hath a drug of mine,"
CYMBELINE. 257
was one sentence? The other modern editors rightly give
the first of these lines as an exclamation, thus ;
" Pisanio, thou that stand'st so for Posthumus ! —
He hath a drug of mine," &c.
SCENE (>.— C. p. 209.
" Great men,
That had a court no bigger than this cave,
That did attend themselves, and had the virtue
Which their own conscience seal'd them, (laying by
That nothing gift of differing multitudes)
Could not out-peer these twain."
" Some dispute has arisen respecting the word 'differing' in this
line, but no commentator has taken what appears to be the plain sense
of the author : ' differing multitudes,' does not mean ' deferring mul-
titudes,' with Theobald, Hanmer, and Warburton ; nor many-headed,
with Johnson; nor unsteady, with Monck Mason and Steevens ;
but merely, as it seems to us, differing in respect of rank from the
persons upon whom the multitudes bestow the ' nothing gift ' of re-
putation. The poet is contrasting, in a manner, the givers with the
person [s] to whom the gift is made." COLLIER.
In act iv. sc. 2, p. 212, Imogen says,
" clay and clay differs in dignity
Whose dust is both alike" :
but the difference there spoken of, is in the present passage so
decidedly implied by the very terms " great men" and " multi-
tudes," that the addition to the latter word of the epithet
" differing" in the sense of differing in respect of rank would
be altogether superfluous, to say nothing of the ridiculous
baldness of the expression. When Monck Mason cited the
following line from the Induction to the Second Part of King
Henry IV., he pointed out the true meaning of " differing" in
the present speech,
" The still discordant, wavering multitude."
258 CYMBELINE.
ACT IV.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 211 ; K. p. 280.
" the lines of my body are as well-drawn as his ; no less young,
more strong, not beneath him in fortunes, beyond him in the advan-
tage of the time, above him in birth, alike conversant in general
services, and more remarkable in single oppositions : yet this imper-
severant thing loves him in my despite/'
" ' Imperseverant ' must be taken in the sense of perseverant,
(as Steevens remarks) like impassioned, &c. ; unless we suppose
Cloten to mean imperceptive, or imperceiving, as regards his advan-
tages over Posthumus. Hanmer reads ' z7/-perseverant.' " COLLIER.
" The im is a prefix to perseverant; in the same way as z'mpas-
sioned." KNIGHT.
The right reading (according to modem orthography) is
undoubtedly " this imperceiverant thing," i. e. ' this thing with-
out the power of perceiving my superiority to Posthumus.'
— A passage of The Widow (by Jonson, Fletcher, and Mid-
dleton) stands as follows in the old copy ;
" methinks the words
Themselves should make him do't, had he but the perseverance
Of a Cock spaiTow, that will come at philip,
And can nor write nor read, poor fool !" Act iii. sc. 2.
where, of course, "perseverance" is, with our present spelling,
" perceiverance," — i. e. ( power of perceiving.'
SCENE 2.— C. p. 221 ; K. p. 290.
" the ruddock would,
With charitable bill," &c.
Mr. Knight remarks (in " Illustrations of Act iv.") that
" the redbreast has always been a favourite with the poets, and
' Robin the mean, that best of all loves men,'
as Browne sings, was naturally employed in the last offices of love,"
&c.
The line just cited from Browne brings to my recollection
a passage of Chapman, which I have never seen quoted, and
which is so singularly beautiful that it deserves to be better
known ;
CYMBELINE. 259
" And yet, when Peace came in, all heauen was cleare ;
And then did all the horrid wood appeare ;
Where mortall dangers more then leaues did growe ;
In which wee could not one free steppe bestowe
For treading on some murtherd Passenger,
Who thither was by witchcraft forc't to erre ;
Whose face the bird hid, that loues Humans best,
That hath the bugle eyes and Rosie Breast,
And is the yellow Autumns Nightingall."
Euthymice Raptus, or The Teares of Peace, &c.
1609, sig. E 4.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 223.
" You were as flowers, now wither'd; even so
These herb'lets shall, which we upon you strew."
Read, with the other modern editors, "strow"; for a rhyme
was as certainly intended here as at the conclusion of the speech ;
" The ground that gave them first has them again :
Their pleasures here are past, so is their pain."
That transcribers were in the habit of writing " strew " and
"strow" indifferently, is beyond a doubt.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 230 ; K. p. 297.
" Pray, sir, to the army :
I and my brother are not known ; yourself,
So out of thought, and thereto so o'ergrown,
Cannot be question'd."
Neither Mr. Collier nor Mr. Knight explains " o'ergrown "
The only note on the word in the Variorum Shakespeare is
the following one by Steevens ;
"o'ergrown] Thus, Spenser;
' oergrown with old decay,
And hid in darkness that none could behold
The hue thereof/ "
Now, when Steevens cited these lines from Spenser (and he
might have cited with equal propriety any other passage of
any poet where the word " o'ergrown" happens to be found),
260 CYMBELINE.
did he understand in what sense Shakespeare here employs
"o'ergrown"? I think not. Its meaning is sufficiently ex-
plained by what Posthumus afterwards says of Belarius ;
" who deserv'd
So long a breeding as his white beard came to." p. 235.
ACT v.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 240.
" Sid. Thy crystal window ope ; look, look out :
No longer exercise,
Upon a valiant race, thy harsh
And potent injuries."
A glaring error of the first folio silently brought back
into the text!! — Read, with the three later folios and the
other modern editors,
" Sid. Thy crystal window ope ; look out."
SCENE 5. — C. p. 256.
" Bel. Stay, sir king.
This is better than the man he slew,
As well descended as thyself."
A word is omitted here. — Read, with all the old copies
and all the other modern editions,
" This man is better than the man he slew."
261
PERICLES.
[Vol. viii. COLLIER ; Supp. vol., Doubtful Plays, &c. Pict. ed. KNIGHT.*]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 280 ; K. p. 68.
" Nor boots it me to say, I honour,
If he suspect I may dishonour him :
And what may make him blush in being known,
He'll stop the course by which it might be known.
With hostile forces he'll o'erspread the land,
And with the ostent of war will look so huge,
Amazement shall drive courage from the state."
" So amended by Tyrwhitt, from stint of the old copies, and not
stent, as Steevens misprinted it : he quoted several instances of the
use of the expression ' ostent of war' in writers of the time, and such
were probably the author's words in this play." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight retains " stint," with the following note ;
" Stint, ' which is the reading of all the copies, has here no
meaning,' according to Malone. Ostent is therefore adopted. But
what has been said just before ? —
' Hell stop the course by which it might be known ?'
He will stop it, by the stint of war. Stint is synonymous with stop,
in the old writers."
In the first place, " the ostent of war," besides that it is
an expression frequently found in early authors, accords well
with the rest of the line "will look so huge," — words which
were most unlikely to have occurred to the poet if he had
written "the stint of war." Secondly, "the stint of war''
could not possibly mean ' the stop of anything by war :' the
only meaning that can be wrung out of it is, * the stop of the
war itself.'
* See note, p. 158.
PERICLES.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 286 ; K. p. 70.
" Our tongues and sorrows do sound deep
Our woes into the air ; our eyes do weep,
Till tongues fetch breath that may proclaim them louder ;
That if heaven slumber, while their creatures want,
They may awake their helps to comfort them/
" We follow the old copies in this somewhat obscure passage,
excepting that in the second line we read ' do' for to, and three lines
lower ' helps' for helpers." COLLIER.
Both Mr. Collier and Mr. Knight give this corrupted
passage with a gross error, from which in the immediately
preceding editions it had been free; for in the third line
they restore, according to the old copies, " tongues," — an
obvious misprint, which Steevens had corrected to "lungs."
I shall not object to Mr. Collier's metrical arrangement of
these lines ; for it really matters little how such a passage is
regulated.
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 296 ; K. p. 78.
" And spite of all the rapture of the sea,
This jewel holds his biding on my arm."
" In the old copies these lines run thus : —
' And spite of all the rupture of the sea,
This jewel holds his building on my arm.'
The novel founded upon ' Pericles' shows that the two words, which
in our text vary from the original copies, have been rightly changed
by the commentators : Pericles, we are informed in the novel, got to
land ' with a jewel, whom all the raptures of the sea could not be-
reave from his arm.' Sewel recommended ' rapture' for rupture, and
Malone substituted ' biding' for building." COLLIER.
How the passage cited from the novel proves that " build-
ing" should be changed to " biding," I am unable to discover.
It is, in fact, a most wanton and unnecessary change : " his
building on my arm" is ' his fixture on my arm.'
Mr. Knight, while he retains the misprint " rupture,"
adopts Malone's alteration " biding."
PERICLES. 263
SCENE 1.— C. p. 297 ; K. p. 78.
" Only, my friend, 1 yet am unprovided
Of a pair of bases.
2 Fish. We'll sure provide : thou shalt have my best gown to
make thee a pair."
On " bases" Mr. Collier has no note. Mr. Knight explains
it " armour for the legs," — an interpretation which the next
speech ought to have shewn him was false ; for if " bases"
meant " armour for the legs," how was the fisherman's " best
gown" to make a pair of bases for Pericles? The word is
rightly explained by Nares, " a kind of embroidered mantle
which hung down from about the middle to about the knees
or lower, worn by knights on horseback :" see Gloss, in v.
SCENE 4. — C. p. 305 ; K. p. 81.
" Hel. Try honour's cause ; forbear your suffrages :
If that you love prince Pericles, forbear."
This nonsense is not questioned either by Mr. Collier or
Mr. Knight. Steevens remarked, ' Perhaps we should read
' Try honour's course : ' but the error does not lie in the word
" cause." The right reading is evidently,
" For honour's cause, forbear your suffrages :"
the letter r was frequently written below the line, and hardly
to be distinguished from y; hence the mistake here of the
original compositor. In the next scene we find,
" I came unto your court for honour's cause." p. 308.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 308 ; K. p. 82.
" Thai. Why, sir, if you had,
Who takes offence at that would make me glad ?"
Mr. Knight prints ;
" Thai. Why, sir, say if you had, who takes offence
At that would make me glad ?"
to the destruction of the rhyme, which was manifestly intended
here. Our early writers, when they introduced a couplet, did
not think it necessary that the first line should be as long as
the second.
264 PERICLES.
SCENE 5.— C. p. 309 ; K. p. 83.
" Thai. Yes, if you love me, sir.
Per. Even as my life, my blood that fosters it."
Read, by all means, with the quarto of 1619 ;
" Even as my life, or blood that fosters it," —
which Mr. Knight gives, and rightly explains, " Even as my
life, or as my blood that fosters my life."
ACT III.
INDUCTION.— C. p. 309 ; K. p. 85.
" And crickets sing at the oven's mouth,
Are the blither for their drouth."
So also Mr. Knight. Malone gave Steevens' emendation,
"As the blither," &c. Boswell defends the original reading,
" Are the blither," &c. on the supposition that it is elliptical
and equivalent to ' which are the blither.'
Read,
" E'er the blither for their drouth :"
The MS. doubtless had " Ere" which the compositor of the
first edition mistook for " Are."
SCENE ].— C. p. 313 ; K. p. 87.
" 1 Sail. Sir, your queen must overboard : the sea works high,
the wind is loud, and will not lie till the ship be cleared of the dead.
Per. That's your superstition.
1 Sail. Pardon us, sir ; with us at sea it hath been still observed,
and we are strong in earnest. Therefore briefly yield her, for she
must overboard straight."
" The old copies read ' strong in eastern,' andMonck Mason very
plausibly suggested that the letters in the word eastern had been
transposed, and that we ought to read ' strong in earnest.' The chief
objection to this is, that in the quarto impressions eastern has one
letter too much, being spelt with a final e — easterne : the folio, 1664,
first omitted it." COLLIER.
Mr. Knight prints " strong in, astern" ! ! — in his long note
PERICLES. 265
on which egregious lection he forgets to mention that it is a
jewel picked out of Jackson's Shakespeare's Genius Justified.
I have not the slightest doubt that Boswell proposed the
true reading here : his note (to which Mr. Collier does not
even allude) is as follows ;
"I would read — 'strong in custom.' They say they have still
observed it at sea, and are strong in their adherence to their usages.
If the letters c and u were slurred, they might easily be mistaken for
ea ; the o not joined at the top might seem like er, and the last stroke
of the m, if disjoined from the others, or carelessly formed, might
pass for ne. The experience of my corrector of the press has sanc-
tioned my conjecture."
SCENE 3.— C. p. 321 ; K. p. 89.
" Till she be married, madam,
By bright Diana, whom we honour all,
Unscissar'd shall this hair of mine remain,
Though I show will int."
" The words, ' Though I show will in't/ appear to mean ' Though
I show myself wilful in doing so.' " COLLIER.
Here all the modern editors either cite, or refer to, a pas-
sage in act v. sc. 3, which (corrupted doubtless) Mr. Collier
gives verbatim from the old eds. thus ;
" Thaisa,
This prince, the fair- betrothed of your daughter,
Shall marry her at Pentapolis. And now,
This ornament,
Makes me look dismal, will I clip to form ;
And what this fourteen years no razor touch'd,
To grace thy marriage-day, I'll beautify." p. 362.
Now, I am altogether at a loss to conceive how these edi-
tors should have failed to see that the words,
" Makes me look dismal,"
determine the right reading in the former passage, viz.
«' Though I show ill in't."
(The misprint " show will" arose merely from the original
compositor having repeated the w.)
266 PERICLES.
ACT IV.
INDUCTION.— C. p. 323; K. p. 92.
" And in this kind hath our Cleon
One daughter, and a wench full grown,
Even ripe for marriage sight : this maid
Hight Philoten ; and it is said
For certain in our story," &c.
" i. e. ripe for the sight of marriage ; — a very clear reading, requir-
ing no change of ' sight' to fight, as Malone altered it. That ' sight'
is the true word we have this evidence — that in Malone's copy of the
quarto, 1609, this passage stands, 'Even right for marriage sight;'
whereas in the Duke of Devonshire's copy of the same edition, right
was corrected (as the sheet went through the press) to ' ripe .•' if
' sight' had been an error, that word would probably not have been
passed over. We might possibly read, ' Even ripe for marriage rite,'
on the supposition that in the manuscript rite was spelt right, and
misprinted ' sight.' " COLLIER.
I do not exactly understand what Mr. Collier means by
" a very clear reading ;" but I feel confident that the one
in question is utterly wrong ; for to no writer of prose or
verse would it ever have occurred to say that a maid was
" ripe for marriage SIGHT," i. e. for the SIGHT of marriage.
Malone's alteration " ripe for marriage^/^" (which he defends
by the words " Cupid's wars" in an earlier part of the play)
has been adopted by Mr. Knight : but such an expression is
utterly at variance with the homely language which through-
out this drama is put into the mouth of ancient Gower, — who
in his Induction to the first act tells us that the beauty of
Antiochus's daughter
" Made many princes thither frame,
To seek her as a bed-fellow,
In marriage-pleasures play -fellow .-"
it was not for him to talk (like a Greek or Latin poet) of
"marriage-^rfa." — In short, what Mr. Collier thinks "we
might possibly read," is undoubtedly the genuine lection, viz. ;
" Even ripe for marriage-n'te."
PERICLES. 267
SCENE 1. — C. p. 326.
" Dion. How now, Marina ! why do you weep alone ?
How chance my daughter is not with you ? Do not
Consume your blood with sorrowing : you have
A nurse of me. Lord ! how your favour's chang'd
With this unprofitable woe !"
" Malone tells us that the earliest copies read keep for ' weep.'
Such is not the case with the quarto, 1609, the property of the Duke
of Devonshire, which, like all the subsequent impressions, has ' weep
alone.' Either word may be right, but, from what follows, ' weep'
seems preferable, and probably was substituted for keep" COLLIER.
To say nothing of the parallel line in Macbeth, act iii.
sc. 2;
" How now, my lord ! why do you keep alone ?"
the context proves that " weep" is a misprint. Dionyza first
asks Marina why she keeps alone, without the company of
Philoten ; and then bids her not indulge in grief.
SCENE 3.— C. p. 331 ; K. p. 95.
" Mar. The more my fault,
To 'scape his hands where I was like to die."
Passed over without any note by Messrs. Malone, Collier,
and Knight. Here "fault" means 'misfortune;' as in The
Merry Wives of Windsor, act i. sc. 1, " 'tis your fault, 'tis
your fault" (which passage also is left unexplained by Mr.
Collier and Mr. Knight). See Gilford's note on Massinger's
Works, ii. 98, ed. 1813.
SCENE 4.— C. p. 334 ; K. p. 96.
" O villain Leonine !
Whom thou hast poison'd too.
If thou hadst drunk to him, it had been a kindness
Becoming well thy face."
What is the meaning of " face," (which neither Mr. Col-
lier nor Mr. Knight attempts to explain) ? Malone gave
M. Mason's conjecture, "feat." — Read "fact." Compare
The Winters Tale, act iii. sc. 2 ;
268 PERICLES.
" As you were past all shame,
(Those of your fact are so) so past all truth."
SCENE 4.- C. p. 335 ; K. p. 96.
" She did disdain my child, and stood between
Her and her fortunes : none would look on her,
But cast their gazes on Marina's face ;
Whilst ours was blurted at, and held a malkin,
Not worth the time of day."
" Steevens plausibly suggested that we ought to read ' distain my
child,' inasmuch as Marina did not ' disdain' Philoten, but show her
off to disadvantage. The old copies afford a clear meaning." COL-
LIER.
Malone and Mr. Knight (the latter without a note) also
retain " disdain" ! — though poor Marina was so far from dis-
daining any one, that she is represented as meekness itself, —
though our old writers constantly use distain in the sense
(absolutely required here) of sullying by contrast) — and
though in the Induction to this act Gower has said,
" Marina gets
All praises, which are paid as debts,
And not as given. This so DARKS
In Philoten all graceful marks,
That Cleori's wife, with envy rare,
A present murderer does prepare," &c.
SCENE 6.— C. p. 340 ; K. p. 98.
" Bawd. We have here one, sir, if she would — but there never
came her like in Mitylene.
Lys. If she'd do the deeds of darkness, thou would'st say."
So too Malone. Did he and Mr. Collier suppose that
murder, house-breaking, robbery, &c. were alluded to? — Mr.
Knight very properly prints " deed."
SCENE 6. — C. p. 342.
" Persevere in that clear way thou goest," &c.
PERICLES. 269
Read, with the other modern editors, " Persever," &c. :
see p. 204.
SCENE 6.— C. p. 344.
" Thou'rt the damn'd door-keeper to every coystrel
That hither comes inquiring for his Tib."
" ' Coystrel' seems to be corrupted from kestrel, a bastard kind
of hawk. The word has occurred before in Vol. iii. p. 331. In the
quarto, 1609, it is spelt custerell." COLLIER.
I have no doubt (in spite of Gifford's note on Jonson's
Works, i. 109), that coystrel and kestrel are distinct words ;
" Coustrell that wayteth on a speare covsteillier." Palsgrave's
Lesclar. de la Lang. Fr., 1530, fol. xxvii. (Table of Subst.)
" A carter a courtyer, it is a worthy warke,
That with his whyp his mares was wonte to yarke ;
A custrell to dryue the deuyll out of the derke," &c.
Skelton's Magnyfycence, — Works, i. 241, ed. Dyce.
See also Nares's Gloss, in v. Coistrel, where we find ;
" Among the un warlike attendants on an army are enumerated,
' Women, lackies, and coisterels.' Holinsh. iii. 272."
In the present passage coystrel is equivalent to * low
groom :' in the next page Marina says ;
" And prostitute me to the basest groom
That doth frequent your house."
ACT v.
SCENE 1. — C. p. 348 ; K. p. 103.
" There is some of worth would come aboard : I pray
Greet him fairly."
" So the quarto, 1609 : the later editions, them; but Helicanus
refers to Lysimachus, who had been mentioned by the Tyrian sailor ;
and by ' some of worth,' Helicanus, of course, means some person of
worth. Modern editors, not perceiving this, have, without warrant
or notice, thrust a word into the line, and read ' some one of worth.' "
COLLIER.
It is really astonishing to find Mr. Collier gravely stating
270 PERICLES.
that " by ' some of worth,' Helicanus, of course, means some
person of worth !" Could he, in any English writer, point
out an example of the expression being so employed ? he
certainly could not. " Some of worth" cannot possibly mean
' some single person of worth ;' it can have no other meaning
than " some persons of worth" (applied here to Lysimachus
and his train, — for Helicanus did not suppose that the
governor of Mitylene would come unattended ; and the pre-
sent speech is immediately followed by "Enter Lysimachus
and Lords"). In the next line, therefore, the reading of the
later editions, " them," is the right one : that " him" was often
put by a mistake of the compositor for "them," has been
already shewn : see p. 64.
Mr. Knight interpolates the passage.
SCENE 1.— C. p. 350 ; K. p. 103.
" O, sir ! a courtesy,
Which if we should deny, the most just God
For every graff would send a caterpillar,
And so inflict our province."
So also Mr. Knight, and without any note. Malone re-
tained " inflict," observing, however,
" I do not believe to inflict was ever used by itself in the sense of
to punish. The poet probably wrote — ' And so afflict our province/ "
Doubtless he did : " inflict" is merely one of the hundred
gross misprints which vitiate the text of this drama.
SCENE 2.— C. p. 357 ; K. p. 106.
" Or perform my bidding, or thou liv'st in woe :
Do 't, and be happy, by my silver bow.
Awake, and tell thy dream."
' Be,' necessary to the sense and measure, is omitted in all the
old editions." COLLIER.
The word "be" supplied by Malone (and adopted also by
Mr. Knight) is an unnecessary addition. The passage ought
to stand thus ;
" Or perform my bidding, or thou liv'st in woe ;
Do it, and happy ; by my silver bow."
PERICLES. 271
"and happy" meaning, as the preceding line evinces, 'and
tJiou livst happy.'
Mr. Knight's punctuation,
" : by my silver bow
Awake, and tell thy dream."
is quite wrong : Diana declares, " by her silver bow," that
Pericles shall be either wretched or happy, as he disobeys or
obeys her bidding.
SCENE 3. — C. p. 360.
" Per. What means the woman ? she dies : help, gentlemen !"
"So the quarto, 1619, and subsequent editions: the quarto,
1609, ' What means the mum ?' which may have been a misprint for
nun : it would suit the measure better, and it would not be unpre-
cedented to call a priestess of Diana a nun." COLLIER.
I do not believe that the author wrote " the woman,"
— a lection which would seem to have been substituted in
the later impressions only because the editors were unable to
elicit the genuine one from " the mum."
Probably, the right reading is either,
" Per. What means she ? mum ! — She dies : help, gentlemen !"
or,
" Per. What means she ? hum !" &c.
In the first scene of this act we find,
" Mar. Hail, sir ! my lord, lend ear.
Per. Hum! ha!" p. 351.
RAPE OF LUCRECE.
[Vol. viii. COLLIER ; Poems, appended to vol. ii. of Tragedies, Pict. ed. KNIGHT.]
C. p. 451.
" O ! let it not be hild
Poor women's faults," &c.
" Thus the old copies ; and it may be necessary to preserve the
false orthography for the sake of the rhyme." COLLIER.
Shakespeare doubtless used " hild" for the sake of the
rhyme ; nor was he singular in doing so ;
" And in the black and gloomy Arts so skild,
That he euen Hell in his subiection hild."
Drayton's Moone-Calfe, p. 174, ed. 1627.
nay, we not unfrequently find that form employed when no
rhyme is in question ;
" I Mid such valiantnes but vaine."
Warner's Albions England, p. 83, ed. 1596.
" With Tantalus Mid starued Ghosts, whose pleasure was their paine."
Id. p. 86.
" Henry (the forth so named) Mid the King deposed strate," &c.
Id. p. 142.
" She oft behild, and Mid her peace," &c. Id. p. 144.
" Some Mid with Phoebus, some with her," &c. Id. p. 151.
" He never Mid but gracious thoughts of women," &c. Id. p. 173.
273
SONNETS.
[Ibid. COLLIER; ibid. KNIGHT.]
SON. xxviii. — C. p. 489.
" I tell the day, to please him thou art bright,
And dost him grace when clouds do blot the heaven :
So natter I the swart-complexion' d night,
When sparkling stars twire not, thou gild'st the even."
"To 'twire' occurs in Chaucer, in the sense of susurro, as'
Tyrwhitt remarks, and that may be the meaning here, though
Steevens supposes that ' twire' is only a corruption of quire. Ben
Jonson, in his ' Sad Shepherd,' uses the word ' twire' for peep, and ••
such is the sense his last editor assigns to it in the line in our text j
(Works, by Gifford, vol. vi. p. 280)." COLLIER.
In the excellent note alluded to, Gifford sneers (as he
well might) at the " foolery" of the commentators on the
present passage, — at Steevens, who "having learned from
Tyrwhitt that twire (spoken of a bird) is probably a transla-
tion of susurro, inclines to think that twire means quire, and 1
consequently that the sense of the line is, ' When sparkling
stars sing not in concert,' &c." Yet Mr. Collier, whose dis-
tinct reference to Grifford's note shews that he must have read
it, not only retails this obsolete " foolery," but declares that
twire may here be used in the same sense as in Chaucer !
Now, could " twire" in the sense of sing accord with the
context ?
" When sparkling stars TWIRE not [t. e. as Gifford well explains
it — do not gleam or appear at intervals], thou GILD'ST the even."
Besides, independently of the context, the expression
" when sparkling stars sing not" is in itself nonsense ; because
the music of the spheres was supposed to be unceasing, — as
Shakespeare knew ;
" There's not the smallest orb, which thou behold'st,
But in his motion like an angel sings,
Still quiring to the young-ey'd cherubins."
Merch. of Venice, act v. sc. 1.
T
274 SONNETS.
Gifford (ubi supra) observes that the verb twire " is fre-
quent in our early writers." He might have added that it
occurs in the works of comparatively recent authors, — for
instance, in Sir R. Steele's Conscious Lovers.
Mrs. Behn uses twire as a substantive ;
" Ah, such an eye, so sparkling, with an amorous twire /"
Feign d Courtizans, act i. sc. 2, — Works, ii. 408, ed. 1702.
275
A LOVER'S COMPLAINT.
Ibid. COLLIER ; ibid. KNIGHT.]
C. p. 546; K. p. 132.
" A thousand favours from a maund she drew
Of amber, crystal, and of bedded jet."
" Possibly a misprint for ' beaded jet,' and so, Malone remarks, it
was formerly printed ; but as the original may mean jet set in metal,
we do not alter it." COLLIER.
" So the original, the word probably meaning jet imbedded, or
set, in some other substance. Steevens has beaded jet, — jet formed
into beads ; which Mr. Dyce adopts," KNIGHT.
Read, by all means, " beaded :" " bedded jet" could not
signify 'jet artificially set in metal or any other substance;'
it could mean nothing but 'jet embedded in its native soil.'
A FEW REMARKS
ON
GIFFORD'S EDITION OF B. JONSOFS WORKS.
279
EVERY MAN OUT OF HIS HUMOUR.
[Vol. ii.]
ACT III.
SCENE 3.— P. 124.
" Oh, your wits of Italy are nothing comparable to her : her
brain's a very quiver of jests, and she does dart them abroad with
that sweet, loose, and judicial aim, that you would," &c.
Gifford, as the punctuation shews, has overlooked the
meaning of " loose," which is here a substantive, — " with that
sweet loose, and judicial aim," &c. Loose is a technical term
for the discharging of an arrow : so in Beaumont and Fletcher's
Cupid's Revenge, act ii. sc. 1 (where see my note) ;
" But he shall know ere long that my smart loose
Can thaw ice, and inflame the wither'd heart
Of Nestor."
280
CYNTHIA'S REVELS.
[Vol. ii.]
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— P. 230.
" Mer. Why so, my little rover?"
In a subsequent passage of this play, " rovers" means ' ar-
rows shot compass-wise, or with a certain degree of elevation'
(see GifFord's note, p. 370) ; and such, when archery is in
question, is generally the meaning of the word. But here
"rover" is equivalent to 'archer:' compare the following lines
of Gosson's Pleasant Quippes for Vpstart Newfangled Gentle-
women, 1595;
" When shooters aime at buttes and prickes,
they set up whites, and shew the pinne :
It may be apornes are like tricks
to teach where rovers game may winne.
Brave archers soone will find the marke,
But bunglers hit it in the darke."
p. 10, reprint.
SCENE 1.— P. 249.
" Amo. Sir, shall I say to you for that hat ? Be not so sad, be
not so sad."
Probably the burden of some forgotten song.
ACT v.
SCENE 2.— P. 346.
" Amo. Here is a hair too much, take it off. Where are thy
mullets?"
" Mullets are small pincers, answering, perhaps, to our curling-
irons. The word is in Coles's English Dictionary ; but I can give
no example of its use by Jonson's contemporaries." GIFFORD.
CYNTHIA'S REVELS. 281
It occurs in The Devils Charter, 1607, by B. Barnes ;
" I will correct these arches with this mullet:
Plucke not too hard : beleeue me, Motticilla,
You plucke to[o] hard." Sig. H.
P. 382.
After the Epilogue ;
" Ecce rubet quidam, pallet, stupet, oscitat, odit*
Hoc volo: nunc nobis carmina nostra placent"
Did Gifford and the other editors suppose that these lines
were by Jonson ? They are Martial's — Lib. vi. Ep. Ixi.
282
THE FOX.
[Vol. iii.]
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— P. 209.
" Scoto of Mantua, sir."
" I know not whether Jonson had any contemporary quack in
view here. The name he has taken from an Italian juggler who was
in England about this time, and exhibited petty feats of legerdemain.
See the Epigrams [vol. viii. 227]. Our poet was a great reader and
admirer of the facetious fopperies of a former age ; and I am strongly
inclined to think that he intended to imitate Andrew Borde, a physi-
cian of reputation in Henry VIII.'s time, who used to frequent fairs
and markets, and there address himself to the people. Here is an
evident imitation of his language," &c. GIFFORD.
It is surely to Scoto, not to Borde, that Jonson alludes in
this scene. Jeronimo Scoto called himself a count, and wan-
dered over the world as a conjuror. I have somewhere read,
that, while in Germany, he first cheated a man of high rank,
then debauched his wife, robbed her, and finally abandoned
her to the fury of her husband. That he was in England in
Elizabeth's time we learn from Nash's Unfortunate Traveller,
or The Life ofJacke Wilton, 1594 ;
" Scoto, that did the iuggling trickes here before the Queene,
neuer came neere him [Cornelius Agrippa] one quarter in magicke
reputation." Sig. F 3.
SCENE 1. — P. 220.
" Heart ! ere to-morrow I shall be new-christen'd,
And call'd the Pantalone di Besogniosi,
About the town."
" t. e. the zany or fool of the beggars. Such, at least, is the
vulgar import of the words ; but Jonson probably affixed a more
opprobrious sense to them." GIFFORD.
THE FOX. 283
Corvino means, ' I shall be called cuckold ;' as the Panta-
lone of the Italian comedy is frequently represented to be.
ACT in.
SCENE 5. — P. 248.
" yet I'm not mad ;
Nor horn-mad, see you ?"
Read " Not."
SCENE 5. — P. 262.
" Guilty men
Suspect what they deserve still."
The thought is from Petronius ;
" Dii deseque, quam male est extra legem viventibus ! quidquid
meruerunt semper expectant." Satyr, cap. cxxv.
ACT IV.
SCENE 2.— P. 282.
" For these not knowing how to owe a gift
Of that dear grace, but with their shame ; being placed
So above all powers of their gratitude,
Began to hate the benefit ; and, in place
Of thanks, devise to extirpe the memory
Of such an act."
From Tacitus ;
" Nam beneficia eo usque Iseta sunt, dum videntur exsolvi posse
ubi multum antevenere, pro gratia odium redditur." Annal. iv. 18.
SCENE 2. — P. 283.
" Mischief doth never end where it begins."
Jonson had in view a passage of Valerius Maximus ;
" Neque enim ullum finitur vitium ibi ubi oritur." Lib. ix. 1.
284
THE SILENT WOMAN.
[Vol. ill]
PROLOGUE.— P. 342.
" Some for your waiting- wench, and city-wires."
" This term, which seems to designate the matrons of the city in
opposition to the ' White-Friars' nation' (see p. 275,) is new to me.
In the stiff and formal dresses of those days, wire indeed was much
used ; but I know not that it was peculiar to the city dames. Per-
haps I have missed the sense." GIFFORD.
Compare ;
" These flaming heads with staring haire,
These wyers twinde like homes of ram," &c.
Gosson's Pleasant Quippes for Vpstart Newfangled
Gentlewomen, 1595, — p. 5, reprint.
" This wire mine own hair covers."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster, act ii. sc. 2.
" unfledge 'em of their tires,
Their wires, their partlets, pins, and perriwigs," &c.
Beaumont and Fletcher's^Km^ of Malta, act i. sc. 1.
" Deuisors of new fashions and strange wyers"
Daniel's Queenes Arcadia, — Workes, p. 337, ed. 1623.
" And haue thy seuerall Gownes and Tires, take place,
It is thy owne, from all the City wires,
And Summer birds in Towne, that once a yeare
Come up to moulter."
Marmyon's Hollands Leaguer, 1632, sig. E.
" Excellent, exceeding, i' faith ! a narrow-eared wire sets out a
cheek so fat and so full," &c. Middleton's Michaelmas Term, —
Works, i. 461, ed, Dyce.
ACT I.
SCENE 1. — P. 346.
" A new foundation, sir, here in the town, of ladies, that call
themselves the collegiates, an order between courtiers and country-
madams, that live from their husbands," &c.
THE SILENT WOMAN. 285
They are alluded to in Maine's City -Match, 1639 ;
" He had
His loves too, and his mistresses ; was enter 'd
Among the philosophical madams ; was
As great with them as their concerners ; and, I hear,
Kept one of them in pension."
Acti. sc. 1.
SCENE 1.— P. 352.
" A brasier is not suffer'd to dwell in the parish, nor an armourer.
He would have hang'd a pewterer's prentice once upon a Shrove-
tuesday's riot, for being of that trade, when the rest were quit"
" Quit, as Whalley observes, means discharged from work." GIF-
FORD.
An erroneous explanation certainly. " Quit" means * ac-
quitted.' He would have hanged the ' pewterer's apprentice
for being of that noisy trade, when the rest of the prisoners,
being of other professions, were acquitted.
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— P. 408.
" notwithstanding all the dangers I laid afore you, in the voice
of a night-crow" &c.
" Jon son literally translates the Greek word vvKriKopa£, a species
of owl, with which we are not acquainted." GIFFOED.
The English word night-crow was common enough before
the production of the present play : a tract, printed in 1590,
is entitled Newnams Nightcrowe ; a Bird that breedeth JBraules
in many Families andHouseholdes, &c. ; and see Shakespeare's
King Henry VI. (Third Part], act v. sc. 6.
There is a Greek epigram on this bird which is worth
quoting for its lively humour ;
NvKTtfcopct£ qfiei SavarrityopoV aX\' orav $,&$
}vi]ffKe.i KCIVTOQ 6 WKTiKopa^,
NIKAPXOY, Anth. Gr. t. iii. 66, ed. Jacobs.
286
BARTHOLOMEW FAIR.
[Vol. iv.]
THE INDUCTION.— P. 362.
" nor a little Davy, to take toll o' the bawds there, as in my time ;
nor a Kindheart, if any body's teeth should chance to ache, in his
play."
" I can say nothing of this person, nor of Kindheart : both were
well known at the time, and probably regular frequenters of the Fair.
The latter was, I suppose, a jack-pudding to a quack, and Fletcher
seems to play upon his name, when he makes the clown say to his
juggling master, ' An you had any mercy, you would not use a Kind-
heart thus/ Maid in the Mill.'' GIFFORD.
Little Davy appears to have been a bully on the town, a
kind of Pistol ;
" At sword and buckler little Dauy was no bodie to him." Dek-
ker's Newesfrom Hell, &c. 1606, sig. B.
(Dekker has the very same passage again in his Knights Con-
iuring, 1607, sig. c.)
" Roughman. Had you but staid the crossing of one field,
You had beheld a Hector, the boldest Trojan
That euer Roughman met with.
For set. Pray what was he ?
Roughman. You talke of Little Davy, Cutting Dick,
And diuers such, but tush, this hath no fellow."
Hey wood's Fair Maid of the West, 1631,
First Part, sig. E 2.
As to Kindheart, who seems to have been an itinerant
tooth-drawer, it will be sufficient to refer the reader to a tract
by Chettle, entitled Kind-Hearts Dream, which has been
lately reprinted, with an Introduction, for the Percy Society.
BARTHOLOMEW FAIR. 287
ACT II.
SCENE 1 — P. 414.
" Urs. Vapours ! never tusk, nor twirl your dibble, good Jordan,
I know what you'll take to a very drop. Though you be captain of
the roarers, and fight well at the case of piss-pots, you shall not
fright me with your lion-chap, sir, nor your tusks."
" A boar is said to tusk, when he is irritated and shews his fangs.
Ursula's next expression is not quite so intelligible. It may mean,
(and I have nothing but conjecture to offer the reader,) never twist or
play with your beard; as Blake was said to do, when he was angry.
In this fantastic age, beards were of all shapes ; we have the ' tile
beard,' the ' dagger beard/ the ' spade beard,' &c. the dibble beard
might possibly be a variety of the latter." GIFFORD.
I suspect, that by " dibble" and " tusks" Ursula means the
same thing: that "tusks" are " mustachoes," is certain from
the following passages ;
" his tuskes tickle his nose." The Wandering Jew (Description of
a Courtier), 1640, (a date considerably later than that of its com-
position), sig. c.
" Had my Barbour
Perfum'd my louzy thatch here, and poak'd out
My Tuskes more stiffe than are a Cats muschatoes,
These pide-wing'd Butterflyes had knowne me then."
S. Rowley's Noble Spanish Soldier, 1634, sig. c.
SCENE 1.— P. 415.
"Mouse. Buy a mousetrap, a mousetrap, or a tormentor for a
flea ?"
In The Trauels of Twelve-pence by Taylor the water-poet,
Twelve-pence, after giving a prodigiously long list of the
various masters whom he had served, is made to say,
" I could name more, if so my Muse did please,
Of Mowse Traps, and Tormentors to kill Fleas."
P. 71,—Workes, ed. 1630.
and that the articles in question were formerly hawked about
the streets of the metropolis, we learn from " The Cries of
Rome [London]" appended to Heywood's Rape of Lucrece;
288 BARTHOLOMEW FAIR.
" Buy a very fine mouse trap or a tormentor
For your fleaes."
Compare too the following passage of Fletcher's Bonduca ;
" First Daughter. Are they not our tormentors ?
Caratach. Tormentors? flea-traps /" Act ii. sc. 3.
ACT III.
SCENE 1. — P. 466.
" Zeath. It shall be hard for him to find or know us, when are
translated, Joan."
Read " when we are.""
289
THE DEVIL IS AN ASS.
[Vol. v.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— P. 20.
" 'fore hell, my heart was at my mouth,
'Till I had view'd his shoes well : for those roses
Were big enough to hide a cloven foot."
The present play was first acted in 1616. In Webster's
White Devil, which was printed in 1612, we find ;
" why, 'tis the devil ;
I know him by a great rose he wears on's shoe,
To hide his cloven foot." Works, i. 132, ed. Dyce.
ACT IV.
SCENE 3.— P. 126.
" Madam, this young Wittipol
Would have debauch' d my wife, and made me cuckold
Thorough a casement ; he did fly her home
To mine own window; but, I think, I sous' d him,
And ravish' d her away out of his pounces."
" All the copies of the folio which I have examined, read sou't, of
which I can make nothing but sought or sous' d; and I prefer the
latter. Whalley reads fought; but he evidently had not consulted
the old copy." GIFFORD.
There can be no doubt that " sou't" is merely the old spel-
ling of " shu'd," — i. e. ' scared away.' " To shue. To scare
or fright away fowls." Jamieson's Et. Diet, of Scot. Lang.
" Shu, a term to frighten poultry." Gloss, of Lancashire
Words in The Works of Tim Bobbin.
ACT V.
SCENE 4.— P. 146.
Thou hast been cheated on, with a false beard,
And a turn'd cloke."
u
290 THE DEVIL IS AN ASS.
There ought to be no point after "on" for "cheated on"
means simply * cheated.' The same mode of expression con-
tinued till Mrs. Centlivre's time : in her Wonder, Don Felix
says to Violante ;
" 'Sdeath, could not you have imposed upon me for this one
night ? could neither my faithful love, nor the hazard I have run to
see you, make me worthy to be cheated on ?" Act ii. sc. 1.
291
THE STAPLE OF NEWS.
[Vol. v.j
ACT I.
SCENE 1.— P. 181.
" Did I not tell you I was bred in the mines,
Under sir Bevis Bullion ?"
Here Gifford has no note.
The name Sir Bevis Bullion contains an evident allusion
to Sir Bevis Bulmer, — a well-known personage of those days,
who, I believe, was superintendent of the Royal Mines, or at
least had some situation connected with them.
Prince, in the " Proemium" to The Worthies of Devon,
mentions that that " famous artist," Sir Bevis Bulmer, Kt.,
by his excellent skill in minerals, extracted a great quantity
of silver from the Combe-Martin mines, a portion of which
he caused to be made into two cups in 1593, and presented
them, inscribed with verses, — the one to William Bourchier,
Earl of Bath, — the other (weighing 137 ounces) to Sir Richard
Martin, Lord Mayor of London, " to continue to the said city
forever." pp. 2, 3, ed. 1701.
Among the Free Gifts paid out of the Exchequer, we
find— in 1603-4 to " Master Bevis Bullmere £100"— in 1607-8
to "Sir Bevis Bulmere £100"— in 1608-9 to "Sir Bevis
Bulmere £500." Nichols's Prog, of King James, i. 426, ii.
191, 246. — For other notices of Sir Bevis, see Lansdov;ne
MSS., 148 fol. 25,— 156 fol. 419, — 162fols. 138, 142,— 169
fol. 166.
SCENE 2. — P. 196.
" P.jun. Fear me not ; for since I came
Of mature age, / have had a certain itch
In my right eye, this corner here, do you see ?
To do some work, and worthy of a chronicle."
292 THE STAPLE OF NEWS.
Jonson, as usual, was thinking of the classics ;
"AXAereu otydaXpoc ptv 6 Se^ioQ.
Theocr. Idyl. iii. 37.
ACT V.
SCENE 1.— P. 291.
" our grave governor
Into a subtler air, and is returned,
As we do hear, grand captain of the jeerers."
" t. e. gone hack to his former situation, &c. This is sufficiently
harsh." GIFFORD.
Qy. is the word used here in the same sense in which we
speak of a candidate being returned member to Parliament ?
293
THE MAGNETIC LADY.
[Vol. vi.]
P. 123.
Alexander Gill's verses " Uppon Ben Johnsons Magnetick Ladye"
Are printed here with strange inaccuracy : a correct copy
of them may be found in Dr. Bliss's ed. of Wood's Ath. Oxon.
vol. ii. 598 (where they are attributed to the elder Alex. Gill,
— a mistake which Dr. Bliss afterwards rectifies in vol. iii. 44).
294
A TALE OF A TUB.
[Vol. vi.]
ACT III.
SCENE 2.— P. 185.
" Young justice Bramble has kept level coyl
Here in our quarters," &c.
" i. e. (in our old dramatists) riot or disturbance. But, properly,
level coil is a game in which each of the parties strives to supplant
and win the place of the other," &c. GIFFORD.
Nares (Gloss, in v.) says that he has found level-coil in no
other passage of our early dramatists besides this of Jonson.
But they not unfrequently employ the term : for instance ;
" Tav. How now ! what coil is here ?
Black. Level- coil, you see, every man's pot."
Beaumont and Fletcher's Faithful Friends,
act 1, sc. 2.
" How easie a worke
Twere for one woman to supply 'em both,
And hold her husband play to levell acoile !
A wooden two-leav'd booke, a paire of tables
Would do't."
Brome's Mad Couple well mate fid, act ii. sc. 1.
(Sig. c 5.)
Compare also Armin's Nest of Ninnies, 1608;
" and so they did, and entered the parlour, found all this leuell
coyle, and his pate broken," &c. p. 28, Shakespeare Society reprint.
(where, p. 61, the editor, not being acquainted with the term,
conjectures " lewd coyl.")
A TALE OF A TUB. 295
And Taylor's Satyr e;
" Whose soul (perhaps) in quenchlesse fire doth broile,
Whilst on the earth his sonne keepes leuell coile"
Workes, p. 260, ed. 1630.
296
THE SAD SHEPHERD.
[Vol. vi.]
ACT I.
SCENE 2.— P. 268.
" Mar. You are a wanton.
Rob. One, I do confess,
I want-ed till you came."
So Lodge ;
" Women are wantons, and yet men cannot want one." Rosalynde.
Euphues golden legacie, &e., 1590, sig. B 2.
ACT II.
SCENE 1.— P. 279.
" Ear. O the fiend on thee !
Gae, take them hence," &c.
" The fol. reads Gar, which Mr. Waldron corrects as hi the text."
GIFFORD.
Jonson was much better acquainted with the northern
phraseology than Waldron, whose " correction" is in fact a
corruption of the text. " Gar take" means ' cause take :' to
gar, i. e. to make, to cause, is still in common use among the
Scotch. I am surprised that Giiford did not recollect the
occurrence of the word in various Scottish ballads which he
must certainly have read, — e. g. in the well-known burthen,
" Fye, gar rub her o'er wi' strae."
ACT II.
SCENE 2.— P. 286.
" Mar. My heart it is wounded, pretty Amie."
Read
" Mar. My heart it is, is wounded, pretty Amie."
THE SAD SHEPHERD. 297
SCENE 2.— P. 295.
" and where the sea
Casts up his slimy ooze, search for a weed
To open locks with," &c.
" This is copied by Shad well in the Lancashire Witches :
' From the sea's slimy ouse a weed
I fetch' d to open locks at need.'
But he honestly refers to the original : ' See (he says) the renown' d
Jonson in the second act of his Sad Shepherd.' " GIFFORD.
In Shirley's Constant Maid, act v. sc. 3, we find,
" Trust not a woman, they have found the herb
To open locks."
on which passage Gifford merely remarks, " See Jonson's Sad
Shepherd, vol. vi. p. 295."
The herb to which this power was attributed is the lunary
or moon-wort : a play called The Unfortunate Usurper, 1663,
contains the following passage ;
" The greatnesse of Princes Fortunes not onely forces 'um to keep
open Court, but (as if the Herb Lunaria were in the Locks} makes all
their Privy-Chamber doors fly open." Act i. sc. 3, p. 6.
And Gerarde, in his Herball, observes, that
" Small Moonewoort \lunaria minor] hath beene used
among the Alchymistes and witches to doe wonders withall, who say,
that it will loose lockes, and make them to fall from the feet of horses
that grase where it doth grow," &c. ; p. 407, ed. 1633.
I may notice here, that verses by Jonson, not included in
Gifford's edition of his works, are prefixed to the following
books :
Coryats Crudities, &c. 1611, 4to.
The Ghost of Richard the Third. Expressing himself e in these
three Parts. 1. His Character. 2. His Legend. 3. His Tragedie,
SfC. (by C. B.— qy. Christopher Brooke?), 1614, 4to.
The Rogve ; or The Life of Guzman De Alfarache, &c. The third
Edition, corrected, folio, 1623.
x
298
Meditations of Mans Mortalitie. Or a way to True Blessednesse .
Written By Mrs. Alice Sutcliffe, wife of John Sutcliffe Esquire, Groome
of his Maiesties most Honourable Privie Chamber. The Second Edi-
tion, enlarged, #c. 1634, 18mo.
299
ADDENDA.
Page 39.
To the passages which I have cited for the sake of shewing
that, in all probability, the true reading is " soil of night,"
add the following one ;
" And now the night with darkenes ouer-spred
Had drawne her sable curtaines ore the earth," &c.
Nicholson's Acolastus, his After-Witte, 1600, sig. i 2.
'7^ ,
Page 125.
After the words " Is not the right reading * Let'?" add —
A line of Fletcher and Massinger's [?] False One, act iii.
sc. 3, stands thus in the old copies ;
" Yet all be ready, as I gave direction."
a misprint, of course, for
" Let all be ready," &c.
Page 163.
Add to examples of rack spelt wrack the following one ;
" The wretch thats torne vpon the torturing wrack
Feeles not more deuilish torment then my hart."
No-Body and Some-Body. With the true Chronicle
Historic of Elydure, &c. n. d. sig. E.
THE END.
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